After the battle of Buena Vista, General Taylor returned to the United States, his task finished. The exploit shed such lustre on his name that he was soon regarded as the fittest candidate for the Presidency.
In March, Scott's army of 12,000 landed at Vera Cruz. After four days' San Juan d'Ulloa captured bombardment by land and water, the city and castle of San Juan d'Ulloa surrendered. General Worth was left in command at Vera Cruz, and Scott started on his march to the City of Mexico, two hundred miles away. Santa Anna, with the flower of his army, awaited him in the strong position of Cerro Gordo, fifty miles northwest. General Twiggs turned the Mexican left flank. On the following morning, April 18, the Americans attacked in three columns. Pellow advanced against the Mexican right, where three hills at an angle in the road were crowned with batteries. Shields' division, climbing by a pass, fell upon Santa Anna's right and rear. Twiggs and Worth, Battle of Cerro Gordo bearing to the right, covered the El Telegrafo Hill, and attacked the height of Cerro Gordo, where Santa Anna commanded in person. Carrying this position, they turned its guns on the retreating Mexicans. Caught between the columns of Pellow, Twiggs and Worth, Santa Anna's forces surrendered. The American troops thus gained the national road to the capital of Mexico. They had made 3,000 prisoners and taken forty-three cannon, with $22,000 in silver and immense munitions of war. They lost, at Cerro Gordo, 481 killed American advance into Mexico and wounded; the Mexican loss was 2,000. Jalapa was occupied on April 19, and on the 22d the American flag waved above the Castle of Perote, fifty miles beyond. Puebla, containing 80,000 inhabitants, was occupied without opposition on May 15. On account of the sufferings of the men in the hot climate, General Scott rested at Puebla for several months.
The authority of the United States was established on the Pacific Coast, after a final defeat of the Mexicans at San Gabriel. Colonel Doniphan of Kearney's command, having been left in charge in New Mexico, compelled the Navajo Indians to enter into a treaty of peace, after which he set out with 1,000 Missourians to join General Wool. At Bracto, a Mexican commander with a superior force sent a black flag demanding his surrender. On refusal of this summons notice was given that no quarter should be granted. The Mexicans then advanced firing; the Americans lying down to escape the bullets. Cheering, the Mexicans ran forward, when suddenly Doniphan's Doniphan's exploit command rose and fired, killing more than 200 Mexicans. The rest turned and fled. Near the capital of Chihuahua, Doniphan, after a sharp encounter, dispersed 4,000 Mexicans. The Stars and Stripes were raised above the citadel. In May, Doniphan rejoined Wool at Saltillo. Then followed a long lull in the Mexican campaign.
The question concerning the power of the American Congress to legislate on slavery again came up in connection with the bill for the establishment of the Oregon Territorial government. In February Calhoun had introduced his new slavery resolution, declaring the Territories to be the common property of all the States, and denying the right and power of Congress to prohibit slavery in any Territory. Thus began the agitation which led to the abrogation of the Missouri Compromise. By the terms of an amendment offered for the extension of the Missouri Compromise line to the Pacific Ocean, Slavery controversy revived slavery was to be excluded from all future territory in the West. This amendment was lost, but the bill passed with another, incorporating the anti-slavery clause of the ordinance of 1787. Calhoun declared that the exclusion of slavery from any Territory was a subversion of the Union, and proclaimed "the separation of the Northern and Southern States complete."
In British North America a new era of home rule began after the Earl of Elgin took his oath as Governor-General of Canada in January. The imperial government abandoned all control over the customs of Canada. The building of the first great Canadian railroad was begun on the main line of the Grand Trunk system. Discouraging reports from the extreme northern regions of America at last confirmed the impression that Sir John Franklin, with John Franklin's career the other members of his expedition, had perished in the Arctic regions. A romantic naval career was thus brought to a close. Born in 1786, John Franklin entered the British navy at the age of fourteen as a midshipman, and soon saw his first active service at the battle of Copenhagen in 1801. In the following year he was taken on his first trip of exploration to Australia by his cousin, Captain Flinders of the "Investigator." In 1818 he was a member of an expedition sent out by the British Government to attempt a passage to India by crossing the Polar Sea. His bold seamanship during this voyage brought him into such prominence that during the next year he was appointed by the Admiralty to command an expedition to travel overland from Hudson's Bay to the Arctic Ocean. During the course of this expedition Long overland journey he and his companions walked 5,560 miles and endured many hardships, of which Franklin wrote a thrilling narrative on his return to England in 1822. He then married Eleanor Porden, the author of the heroic poem "Cœur de Lion." In 1825 he was appointed to the command of another overland Arctic expedition. When the day of his departure arrived, his wife was dying of consumption. Lying at the point of death as she was, she would not let him delay his voyage, and gave him for a parting gift a silk flag to hoist when he reached the Polar Sea. On the day after Franklin left England she died. When he returned again he was knighted and showered with honors by various scientific societies of England and France. After serving as Governor of Van Diemen's Land, Sir John, in 1845, was appointed an admiral, and then another Arctic expedition to discover the Northwest Passage was organized. He sailed from Sheerness on May 26, 1845, and was last seen by a whaler in Baffin's Bay. Many years later a record was found on the northwest shore of King William's Land, announcing that Sir John Franklin died in the spring of 1847, and that the survivors of his The Northwest Passage expedition had attempted to make their way back on the ice to the American continent. To Sir John Franklin belongs the honor of the first discovery of the northwest passage leading from Lancaster Sound to Behring Strait.
On February 8, Daniel O'Connell, the great Irish Parliamentary leader, made his last speech in the English House of Commons. The question on which he O'Connell's last speech spoke was a proposed bill for the relief of famine in Ireland: "I am afraid," he said, in the course of this address, "that the English people are not sufficiently impressed with the horrors of the situation in Ireland. I do not think they understand the accumulated miseries which my people are suffering. It has been estimated that 5,000 adults and 10,000 children have already died from famine, and that one-fourth of the whole population must perish unless something is done." Failing in health himself, O'Connell went to Italy. At Rome, Pope Pius IX. prepared a Death of O'Connell magnificent reception for him. Before he could reach the Eternal City, O'Connell died in his seventy-second year. Lacordaire, who but shortly before this had pronounced his greatest of funeral orations over the bier of General Drouot, thus spoke of O'Connell: "Honor, glory and eternal gratitude for the man who gave to his country the boon of liberty of conscience. Where is a man in the Church since the time of Constantine who has at one stroke enfranchised six millions of souls?" When the body of O'Connell was buried at Glasnevin, it was followed to the grave by fifty thousand mourners, among whom Orangemen and Ribbonmen walked side by side. In England, O'Connell's death was regarded with a feeling akin to relief. There his persistent demands of "justice for Ireland" had come to be regarded with derision, bringing him the nickname of "Big Beggarman."
Another spirit that won religious renown in England passed away with Thomas Death of Thomas Chalmers Chalmers, the great Scotch divine. As a teacher of theology at Edinburgh he wrote no less than twenty-five volumes, the most famous of which is his "Evidences of the Christian Revelations," a reprint of his article on "Christianity" contributed to the "Encyclopedia Britannica." In other respects it was a notable year for English letters. Charles Dickens had "Vanity Fair" just published his famous stories "Dombey and Son" and "The Haunted Man." The success of these novels was surpassed by that of Thackeray's "Vanity Fair." Three writers now made their appearance. Anthony Trollope brought out his "MacDermotts of Ballycoran"; Emily Brontë published her first "Jane Eyre" novel, "Wuthering Heights," while her sister, Charlotte Brontë, at the same time achieved an immense success with her story of "Jane Eyre." These successes were more than rivalled by that of Jenny Lind, the great soprano singer, who made her first appearance in London during this season. Another Jenny Lind event for intellectual England was the sale at auction of Shakespeare's house at Stratford. It was acquired by a united committee of Shakespeare lovers for the sum of £3,000.
The oft-mooted question of the civil disabilities of the Jews in England was brought up again by the election of Baron Rothschild as a member of Jewish disabilities reconfirmed Parliament for London, together with Lord John Russell. The Premier, whose name was already identified with the cause of civil and religious liberty, made another strong effort to obtain the recognition of his colleague's claim to his seat. He was supported in this not only by most of the Whigs in the House of Commons, but also by three such prominent men of the opposition as Lord Bentinck, Gladstone and Benjamin Disraeli, himself of Jewish lineage. As heretofore, this proposed reform was accepted by the Commons only to be rejected by the Lords, now installed in their new House of Peers. Otherwise, Lord Russell's Ministry followed largely in the footsteps of their immediate predecessors. Palmerston pursued his wonted vigorous foreign policy.
It had been customary in Greek towns to celebrate Easter by burning an effigy of Judas Iscariot. This year the police of Athens were ordered to prevent this performance, and the mob, disappointed of their favorite amusement, ascribed the new orders to the influence of the Jews. The house Don Pacifico affair of one Don Pacifico, a Portuguese Jew of Gibraltar, happened to stand near the spot where the Judas was annually burned. Don Pacifico was known to be a Jew, and the anger of the mob was wreaked upon him accordingly. On April 4, his house was sacked. Don Pacifico made a claim against the Greek Government for compensation. He estimated his losses, direct and indirect, at nearly £32,000. Another claim was made at the same time by another British subject, Finlay, the historian of Greece. The Greek Government, British retaliation which was all but bankrupt, was dilatory in settling these claims. A British fleet was ordered to the Piræus. It seized all the Greek vessels belonging to the government and to private merchants that were found within those waters. The Greek Government appealed to France and Russia as Powers joined with England in the treaty to protect the independence of Greece. France and Russia both made bitter complaint of not having been consulted in the first instance by the British Government, nor was their feeling Palmerston obdurate softened by Lord Palmerston's peremptory reply that it was all a question between England and Greece. It was on this occasion that Palmerston made the famous speech harking back to the sentiment expressed in the old Roman boast "Civis Romanus Sum."
Next, new troubles arose with China. During the previous year riots broke out in Canton, by reason of a superstitious belief that a weather-vane on top of the flagstaff over the American Consulate interfered with the spirits of the air. A Chinaman was shot during the riots. The British had to interfere on behalf of the threatened Americans. The outraged feelings Troubles in China of the Chinese populace were allayed by a conciliatory declaration of Emperor Taouk-Wang, to the effect that the Christian religion could be commended as a faith for inculcating the principles of virtue. At the same time he sent a special commissioner, Ke-Ying, "amicably to regulate the commerce with foreign merchants at Canton." Trouble again broke out in March, when a small English hunting and fishing party violated the agreement confining them to the foreign concession at Canton. They were pelted with stones by the natives. Sir John Davis denounced this incident as international outrage, and, in disregard of the accepted treaty provisions, proclaimed "that he would exact and acquire from the Chinese Government that British subjects should be as free from molestation and insult in China as they would be in England." On April 1, all the available Bogue forts recaptured forces at Hong Kong were summoned to Canton. Three steamships, bearing two regiments of soldiers, convoyed by a British man-of-war, attacked the Bogue forts. The Chinese, acting under orders from Ke-Ying, made no resistance. A British landing force seized the batteries and spiked the guns. Next, the forts opposite Canton were captured without a blow. Without a shot fired, Canton, on April 3, lay at the mercy of the British guns. Ke-Ying accepted the British ultimatum that the whole city of Canton should be opened to A Chinese protest Englishmen two years from date. The agreement was closed with this significant statement on behalf of the Chinese Emperor: "If mutual good-will is to be maintained between the Chinese and foreigners, the common feelings of mankind, as well as the just principles of heaven, must be considered and conformed with."