Ulysses S. Grant's Memoirs The Mexican War
Chapter 12 Promotion To First Lieutenant -- Capture of the City of Mexico -- The Army -- Mexican Soldiers -- Peace Negotiations
On entering the city the troops were fired upon by the released convicts,
and possibly by deserters and hostile citizens. The streets were deserted,
and the place presented the appearance of a "city of the dead," except for
this firing by unseen persons from house-tops, windows, and around corners.
In this firing the lieutenant-colonel of my regiment, Garland, was badly
wounded, Lieutenant Sidney Smith, of the 4th infantry, was also wounded mortally.
He died a few days after, and by his death I was promoted to the grade of
first lieutenant. I had gone into the battle of Palo Alto in May,
1846, a second lieutenant, and I entered the city of Mexico sixteen months
later with the same rank, after having been in all the engagements possible
for any one man and in a regiment that lost more officers during the war
than it ever had present at any one engagement. My regiment lost four
commissioned officers, all senior to me, by steamboat explosions during the
Mexican war. The Mexicans were not so discriminating. They sometimes picked
off my juniors.
(NOTE.-It had been a favorite idea with General Scott for a great many years before the Mexican war to have established in the United
States a soldiers' home, patterned after something of the kind abroad
particularly, I believe, in France. He recommended this uniformly, or at
least frequently, in his annual reports to the Secretary of War, but never
got any hearing. Now, as he had conquered the state, he made assessments
upon the different large towns and cities occupied by our troops, in proportion
to their capacity to pay, and appointed officers to receive the money. In
addition to the sum thus realized he had derived, through capture at Cerro
Gordo, sales of captured government tobacco, etc., sums which swelled the
fund to a total of about $220,000. Portions of this fund were distributed
among the rank and file, given to the wounded in hospital, or applied in
other ways, leaving a balance of some $118,000 remaining unapplied at the
close of the war. After the war was over and the troops all home,
General Scott applied to have this money, which had never been turned into
the Treasury of the United States, expended in establishing such homes as
he had previously recommended. This fund was the foundation of the Soldiers'
Home at Washington City, and also one at Harrodsburgh, Kentucky.
The latter went into disuse many years ago. In fact it never had many soldiers
in it, and was, I believe, finally sold.)
General Scott soon followed the troops into the city, in state. I wonder
that he was not fired upon, but I believe he was not; at all events he was
not hurt. He took quarters at first in the "Halls of the Montezumas," and
from there issued his wise and discreet orders for the government of a conquered
city, and for suppressing the hostile acts of liberated convicts already
spoken of--orders which challenge the respect of all who study them. Lawlessness
was soon suppressed, and the City of Mexico settled down into a quiet,
law-abiding place. The people began to make their appearance upon the sheets
without fear of the invaders. Shortly afterwards the bulk of the troops were
sent from the city to the villages at the foot of the mountains, four or
five miles to the south and south-west.
Whether General Scott approved of the Mexican war and the manner in which
it was brought about, I have no means of knowing. His orders to troops indicate
only a soldierly spirit with probably a little regard for the perpetuation
of his own fame. On the other hand, General Taylor's, I think, indicate that
he considered the administration accountable for the war, and felt no
responsibility resting on himself further than for the faithful performance
of his duties. Both generals deserve the commendations of their countrymen
and to live in the grateful memory of this people to the latest generation.
Earlier in this narrative I have stated that the plain, reached after passing
the mountains east of Perote, a extends to the cities of Puebla and Mexico.
The route traveled by the army before reaching Puebla, goes over a pass
in a spur of mountain coming up from the south. This pass is very susceptible
of defense by a smaller against a larger force. Again, the highest point
of the road-bed between Vera Cruz and the City of Mexico is over Rio Frio
mountain, which also might have been successfully defended by an inferior
against a superior force. But by moving north of the mountains, and about
thirty miles north of Puebla, both of these passes would have been avoided.
The road from Perote to the City of Mexico, by this latter route, is as level
as the prairies in our West. Arriving due north from Puebla, troops could
have been detached to take possession of that place, and then proceeding
west with the rest of the army no mountain would have been encountered before
reaching the City of Mexico. It is true this road would have brought troops
in by Guadalupe town, church and detached spur of mountain about two miles
north of the capital, all bearing the same general name--and at this point
Lake Texcoco comes near to the mountain, which was fortified both at the
base and on the sides: but troops could have passed north of the mountain
and come in only a few miles to the north-west, and so flanked the position,
as they actually did on the south.
It has always seemed to me that this northern route to the City of Mexico,
would have been the better one to have taken. But my later experience has
taught me two lessons: first, that things are seen plainer after the events
have occurred; second, that the most confident critics are generally those
who know the least about the matter criticized. I know just enough about
the Mexican war to approve heartily of most of the generalship, but to differ
with a little of it. It is natural that an important city like Puebla should
not have been passed with contempt; it may be natural that the direct road
to it should have been taken; but it could have been passed, its evacuation
insured and possession acquired without danger of encountering the enemy
in intricate mountain defiles. In this same way the City of Mexico
could have been approached without any danger of opposition, except in the
open field.
But General Scott's successes are an answer to all criticism. He invaded
a populous country, penetrating two hundred and sixty miles into the interior,
with a force at no time equal to one-half of that opposed to him; he was
without a base; the enemy was always entrenched, always on the defensive;
yet he won every battle, he captured the capital, and conquered the government.
Credit is due to the troops engaged, it is true, but the plans and the strategy
were the general's.
I had now made marches and been in battle under both General Scott and General
Taylor. The former divided his force of 10,500 men into four columns, starting
a day apart, in moving from Puebla to the capital of the nation, when it
was known that an army more than twice as large as his own stood ready to
resist his coming. The road was broad and the country open except in crossing
the Rio Frio mountain. General Taylor pursued the same course in marching
toward an enemy. He moved even in smaller bodies. I never thought at the
time to doubt the infallibility of these two generals in all matters pertaining
to their profession. I supposed they moved in small bodies because more men
could not be passed over a single road on the same day with their artillery
and necessary trains. Later I found the fallacy of this belief. The rebellion,
which followed as a sequence to the Mexican war, never could have been suppressed
if larger bodies of men could not have been moved at the same time than was
the custom under Scott and Taylor.
The victories in Mexico were, in every instance, over vastly superior numbers.
There were two reasons for this. Both General Scott and General Taylor had
such ties as are not often got together. At the battles of Palo Alto and
Resaca de la Palma General Taylor had a small army, but it was composed
exclusively of regular troops, under the best of drill and discipline. Every
officer, from the highest to the lowest, was educated in his profession,
not at West Point necessarily, but in the camp, in garrison, and many of
them in Indian wars. The rank and file were probably inferior, as material
out of which to make an army, to the volunteers that participated in all
the later battles of the war; but they were brave men, and then drill and
discipline brought out all there was in them. A better army, man for man,
probably never faced an enemy than the one commanded by General Taylor in
the earliest two engagements of the Mexican war. The volunteers who followed
were of better material, but without drill or discipline at the start. They
were associated with so many disciplined men and professionally educated
officers, that when they went into engagements it was with a confidence they
would not have felt otherwise. They became soldiers themselves almost at
once. All these conditions we would enjoy again in case of war.
The Mexican army of that day was hardly an organization. The private soldier
was picked up from the lower class of the inhabitants when wanted; his consent
was not asked; he was poorly clothed, worse fed, and seldom paid. He was
turned adrift when no longer wanted. The officers of the lower grades were
but little superior to the men. With all this I have seen as brave stands
made by some of these men as I have ever seen made by soldiers. Now Mexico
has a standing army larger than that of the United States. They have a military
school modeled after West Point. Their officers are educated and, no doubt,
generally brave. The Mexican war of 1846-8 would be an impossibility in this
generation.
The Mexicans have shown a patriotism which it would be well if we would imitate
in part, but with more regard to truth. They celebrate the anniversaries
of Chapultepec and Molino del Rey as of very great victories. The anniversaries
are recognized as national holidays. At these two battles, while the United
States troops were victorious, it was at very great sacrifice of life
compared with what the Mexicans suffered. The Mexicans, as on many other
occasions, stood up as well as any troops ever did. The trouble seemed to
be the lack of experience among the officers, which led them after a certain
time to simply quit, without being particularly whipped, but because they
had fought enough. Their authorities of the present day grow enthusiastic
over their theme when telling of these victories, and speak with pride of
the large sum of money they forced us to pay in the end. With us, now twenty
years after the close of the most stupendous war ever known, we have writers--who
profess devotion to the nation--engaged in trying to prove that the Union
forces were not victorious; practically, they say, we were slashed around
from Donelson to Vicksburg and to Chattanooga; and in the East from Gettysburg
to Appomattox, when the physical rebellion gave out from sheer exhaustion.
There is no difference in the amount of romance in the two stories.
I would not have the anniversaries of our victories celebrated, nor those
of our defeats made fast days and spent in humiliation and prayer; but I
would like to see truthful history written. Such history will do full credit
to the courage, endurance and soldierly ability of the American citizen,
no matter what section of the country he hailed from, or in what ranks he
fought. The justice of the cause which in the end prevailed, will, I doubt
not, come to be acknowledged by every citizen of the land, in time. For the
present, and so long as there are living witnesses of the great war of sections,
there will be people who will not be consoled for the loss of a cause which
they believed to be holy. As time passes, people, even of the South, will
begin to wonder how it was possible that their ancestors ever fought for
or justified institutions which acknowledged the right of property in man.
After the fall of the capital and the dispersal of the government of Mexico,
it looked very much as if military occupation of the country for
a long time might be necessary, General Scott at once began the preparation
of orders, regulations and laws in view of this contingency. He contemplated
making the country pay all the expenses of the occupation, without the army
becoming a perceptible burden upon the people. His plan was to levy a direct
tax upon the separate states, and collect, at the ports left open to trade,
a duty on all imports. From the beginning of the war private property had
not been taken, either for the use of the army or of individuals, without
full compensation. This policy was to be pursued. There were not troops enough
in the valley of Mexico to occupy many points, but now that there was no
organized army of the enemy of any size, reinforcements could be got from
the Rio Grande, and there were also new volunteers arriving from time to
time, all by way of Vera Cruz. Military possession was taken of Cuernavaca,
fifty miles south of the City of Mexico; of Toluca, nearly as far west, and
of Pachuca, a mining town of great importance, some sixty miles to the
north-east. Vera Crux, Jalapa, Orizaba, and Puebla were already in our
possession.
Meanwhile the Mexican government had departed in the person of Santa Anna,
and it looked doubtful for a time whether the United States commissioner,
Mr. Trist, would find anybody to negotiate with. A temporary government,
however, was soon established at Queretaro, and Trist began negotiations
for a conclusion of the war. Before terms were finally agreed upon he was
ordered back to Washington, but General Scott prevailed upon him to remain,
as an arrangement had been so nearly reached, and the administration must
approve his acts if he succeeded in making such a treaty as had been contemplated
in his instructions. The treaty was finally signed the 2d of February, 1848,
and accepted by the government at Washington. It is that known as the "Treaty
of Guadalupe Hidalgo," and secured to the United States the Rio Grande as
the boundary of Texas, and the whole territory then included in New Mexico
and Upper California, for the sum of $15,000,000.
Soon after entering the city of Mexico, the opposition of Generals Pillow,
Worth and Colonel [James] Duncan to General Scott became very marked. Scott
claimed that they had demanded of the President his removal. I do not know whether this is so or not, but I do know of their unconcealed hostility to their chief. At last he placed them in arrest and preferred charges against them of insubordination and disrespect. This act brought on a crisis in the career of the general commanding. He had asserted from the beginning that the administration was hostile to him; that it had failed in its promises of men and war material; that the President himself had shown duplicity if not treachery in the endeavor to procure the appointment of Benton and the administration now gave open evidence of its enmity. About the middle of February orders came convening a court of inquiry, composed of Brevet Brigadier-General Towson, the paymaster of the army, Brigadier-General [Caleb] Cushing and Colonel [William G.] Belknap, to inquire into the conduct of the accused and the accuser, and shortly afterwards orders were received from Washington, relieving Scott of the command of the army in the field
and assigning Major-General William O. Butler of Kentucky to the place. This
order also released Pillow, Worth and Duncan from arrest.
If a change was to be made the selection of General Butler was agreeable
to every one concerned, so far as I remember to have heard expressions on
the subject. There were many who regarded the treatment of General Scott
as harsh and unjust. It is quite possible that the vanity of the General
had led him to say and do things that afforded a plausible pretext to the
administration for doing just what it did and what it had wanted to do from
the start. The court tried the accuser quite as much as the accused. It was
adjourned before completing its labors, to meet in Frederick, Maryland. [The charges against Worth and Duncan were dropped and Pillow was eventually cleared although the court of inquiry concluded that Pillow had claimed more honors in the battle of Contreras than he deserved. Henry.] General Scott left the country, and never after had more than the nominal command of the army until early in 1861. He certainly was not sustained in his efforts to maintain discipline in high places.
The efforts to kill off politically the two successful generals, made them both candidates for the Presidency. General Taylor was nominated in 1848, and was elected. Four years later General Scott received the nomination but was badly beaten, and the party nominating him died with his defeat.
[The Mexican war made three presidential candidates, Scott Taylor, and Pierce -- and any number of aspirants for that high office. It made also governors of States, members of the cabinet, foreign ministers, and other officers of high rank both in state and nation. The rebellion, which contained more war in a single day, at some critical periods, than the whole Mexican war in two years, has not been so fruitful of political results to those engaged on the Union side. On the other side, the side of the South, nearly every man who holds office of any sort whatever, either in the state or in the nation, was a Confederate soldier; but this is easily accounted for from the fact that the South was a military camp, and there were very few people of a suitable age to be in the army who were not in it.]
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