EL PASO TO ROSALES
Near the end of August the governor was forced out, and Angel Trias, an active, ambitious man, rich, and most unfriendly to the Americans, took his place; and the great body of the citizens, either anxious to defend themselves against invasion or dreading to be thought disloyal, rallied about him. The central government became interested, ordered several northern states to aid Chihuahua, and instructed Reyes, comandante general of Zacatecas, to assume the defence of New Mexico, Chihuahua and Durango. But embarrassments then arose; delays ensued; and Santa Anna, according to his policy of concentrating the military strength of the country under his own command and disregarding non-essential territory, frowned upon all national efforts to defend the northern frontier. It was now November; and the government, appointing the unpopular Heredia comandante general at Chihuahua, yielded to Santa Anna’s views.[13]
Trias, however, did not abandon hope. The resources of the state were scanty indeed. The effective colonial method of protecting the border had long since been given up, and Indian raids, beginning about 1831, had fast impoverished the haciendas. During the past year, perhaps because the savages believed the Mexican troops would be required for the war, these incursions had been worse than ever before. A single party of Comanches had numbered more than eight hundred. It was indispensable, therefore, to employ some of the military forces in the protection of the settlements; but more than 10,000 men were enrolled in the National Guard, and Trias felt sure that Chihuahua state was inherently strong enough to defeat Doniphan, whose approach was duly reported.[13]
The chief needs were money and armament. Artillery had been practically unknown in that region, but it was found possible to cast and mount a number of pieces, and infantry soldiers learned to use them. Arms were gathered and repaired; ammunition and clothing were manufactured; and by dint of local borrowing the expenses were met. Santa Anna finally had 255 men sent from Durango; and in the end nearly 1200 mounted troops (many of them Presidials), some 1500 infantry including about seventy regulars of the Seventh Regiment, 119 artillery, probably more than 1000 rancheros armed with long knives (machetes) and rude lances, ten brass cannon ranging from 4-pounders to 9-pounders, and nine musketoons on carriages appear to have been assembled.[12] The men were enthusiastic and eagerly obedient, and the leaders—Heredia for chief and Trias as second in command—felt proud of their army. As for the Brazito affair, which had caused much discouragement, it seemed now like a bad dream.[13]
THE SACRAMENTO POSITION
BATTLE OF SACRAMENTO
Feb. 28, 1847
February 10 a portly, handsome officer arrived at Chihuahua. This was General García Conde, and the next day he and the other chiefs, after reconnoitring the pass at the Sacramento River, fifteen or eighteen miles to the north, decided to make a stand at that point. It was a wise decision. The stream, running here toward the east, was crossed at a ford by the route from El Paso, which had a north and south direction. Rather more than two miles north of the river and approximately parallel with it, there was a broad watercourse, now dry and sandy, known as the Arroyo Seco, which after crossing the El Paso highway continued in its easterly course about a mile and a half, turned then toward the south, and joined the river about a mile and a half below the ford. Along the northern bank of the Arroyo lay a road, which extended on the eastern side of the highway to the junction of this watercourse with the Sacramento, while on the western side, bending toward the south, it crossed that river three miles or so above the ford, passed the hacienda of El Torreón, penetrated a defile in the steep and rocky foothills thrust out here by the western cordillera, and rejoined the highway about six miles farther on toward Chihuahua. A triangular block of rugged hills lay thus between this road, the highway and the river, the northeastern corner of which (called Sacramento Hill) almost reached the solid adobe buildings of Sacramento hacienda near the ford.[13]
Between the river and the Arroyo lay elevated ground cut straight across by the highway. The portion west of the highway was a fairly smooth plateau ascending very gently toward the western cordillera, but the other part rose immediately east of the highway about fifty feet, and formed—roughly speaking—a square one and a half miles on a side, with a broad, smooth hollow in the middle that debouched at the southeastern corner toward the Sacramento, and a dominating hill called the Cerro Frijoles at the northeastern corner, toward which the square sloped up. On the north and west edges of the square the Mexicans constructed a series of well-planned and well-executed redoubts alternating with breastworks—which extended from Cerro Frijoles at the northeast to what we may call Fort N at the southwest—supplemented near the ford with fortifications on both banks of the river, and finally with a redoubt halfway up Sacramento Hill; and these works commanded perfectly the highway, the Arroyo road and the valley of the river. The Torreón route seemed impracticable for the American wagons, but even here fortifications were erected; and still others guarded the Arroyo near its junction with the Sacramento. The principal camp lay in the hollow of the square, which not only protected the troops but concealed both their numbers and their movements.[13]