CAPTURE OF MEXICO.
Whatever may be said of the justice of our war with Mexico, no criticism can be offered as to the brilliancy of the result. The campaign of General Scott against the ancient capital of the Aztecs, was almost spectacular; certainly it was heroic.
On the ninth of March, 1847, the General, then nearly sixty-one years of age, arrived at Vera Cruz, with an army of 12,000 men. That city was taken in about a week, and the way was opened from the coast to the capital. The advance began on the eighth of April, and ten days afterward the rocky pass of Cerro Gordo was carried by assault. Santa Anna barely escaped with his life, leaving behind 3000 prisoners, his chest of private papers, and his wooden leg!
On the twenty-second of the same month, the strong castle of Perote, crowning a peak of the Cordilleras, was taken without resistance. Then the sacred city of Puebla was captured. On the seventh of August, Scott, with his reduced forces, began his march over the crest of the mountains against the city of Mexico. The American army, sweeping over the heights, looked down on the valley. Never before had a soldiery in a foreign land beheld a grander scene Clear to the horizon stretched a living landscape of green fields, villages, and lakes—a picture too beautiful to be marred with the dreadful enginery of war.
The American army advanced by the way of Ayotla. The route was the great national road from Vera Cruz to Mexico. The last fifteen miles of the way was occupied with fortifications, both natural and artificial, and it seemed impossible to advance directly to the gates of the city. The army was accordingly brought around Lake Chalco, and thence westward to San Augustine. This place is ten miles from the capital. The approach now lay along causeways, across marshes and the beds of bygone lakes. At the further end of each causeway, the Mexicans had built massive gates. There were almost inaccessible positions at Contreras, San Antonio and Molino del Rey. Further on toward the city lay the powerful bulwarks of Churubusco and Chapultepec. The latter was of great strength, and seemed impregnable. These various outposts were held by Santa Anna with a force of fully thirty thousand Mexicans.
The first assaults of the Americans were made on the nineteenth of August, by Generals Pillow and Twiggs. The line of communications between Contreras and Santa Anna's army was cut, and in the darkness of the following night an assault was made by General Persifer F. Smith, who about sunrise carried the place and drove the garrison pell-mell. This was the first victory of the memorable twentieth of August.
A few hours later, General Worth compelled the evacuation of San Antonio. This was the second victory. About the same time, General Pillow advanced on Churubusco, and carried one of the heights. The position was taken by storm, and the enemy scattered like chaff. This was the third triumph. The division of General Twiggs added a fourth victory by storming and holding another height of Churubusco, while the fifth and last was achieved by General Shields and Pierce, who drove back an army of reinforcements under Santa Anna. The Mexicans were thus forced back into the fortifications of Chapultepec.
On the following morning, the alarm and treachery of the Mexican authorities were both strongly exhibited. A deputation came out to negotiate; but the intent was merely to gain time for strengthening the defences. The terms proposed by the Mexicans were preposterous when viewed in the light of the situation. General Scott, who did not consider his army vanquished, rejected the proposals with scorn. He, however, rested his men until the seventh of September before renewing hostilities. On the morning of the eighth, General Worth was thrown forward to take Molino del Rey and Casa de Mata, which were the western defences of Chapultepec. These places were defended by about fourteen thousand Mexicans; but the Americans, after losing a fourth of their number in the desperate onset, were again victorious. The batteries were now turned on Chapultepec itself, and on the thirteenth of September that frowning citadel was carried by storm. This exploit opened an avenue into the city. Through the San Cosine and Belen gates the conquering army swept resistlessly, and at nightfall the soldiers of the Union were in the suburbs of Mexico.
During the night, Santa Anna and the officers of the Government fled from the city, but not until they had turned loose from the prisons 2000 convicts, to fire upon the American army. On the following morning, before day-dawn, a deputation came forth from the city to beg for mercy. This time the messengers were in earnest; but General Scott, wearied with trifling, turned them away with disgust. "Forward!" was the order that rang along the American lines at sunrise. The war-worn regiments swept into the beautiful streets of the famous city, and at seven o'clock the flag of the United States floated over the halls of the Montezumas. It was the triumphant ending of one of the most brilliant and striking campaigns of modern history.
The American army, as compared with the hosts of Mexico, had been but a handful. The small force which had left Vera Cruz on the march to the capital had lost considerably by battle and disease. Many detachments had been posted en route to hold the line of communications, and for garrison duty in places taken from the enemy. The army had thus dwindled until, after the battles of Churubusco and Chapultepec, fewer than six thousand men were left to enter and hold the capital.
The invasion had been remarkable in all its particulars. The obstacles which had to be overcome seemed insurmountable. There were walled cities to be taken, fortified mountain passes to be carried by storm, and frowning castles with cannon on the battlements to be assaulted by regiments whose valor and impetuosity were their only protection and warrant of victory. Yet the campaign was never seriously impeded. No foot of ground once taken from the Mexicans was yielded by false tactics or lost by battle.
The army which accomplished this marvel, penetrating a far-distant and densely peopled country, held by a proud race, claiming to be the descendants of Cortes and the Spanish heroes of the sixteenth century, and denouncing at the outset the American soldiers as "barbarians of the North," was, in large part, an army of volunteers—a citizen soldiery—which had risen from the States of the Union and marched to the Mexican border under the Union flag.