This is what will save us, proclaimed in effect the legislature of México state.exclaimed the congress of Vera Cruz. Santa Anna endorsed the plan. Salas organized thewhich were to make” “in every manner imaginable”; and in April, 1847, the government, pinning its faith to the system, set it on foot in earnest. Scott, thewas to be routed after all.[3]
THE GUERILLAS OF THE NORTHEAST
In the north February, 1847, was the golden month of the irregulars, for the approach of the Mexican army under Santa Anna encouraged the rancheros to lay aside the habits of peace. Canales boasted of 161 Americans killed that month, and Urrea with his combined force of regulars and guerillas, besides engaging in other operations, captured a train of wagons at Agua Negra, and horribly slaughtered a large number of guards and teamsters. To avenge this butchery a party of Rangers, teamsters and other civilians murdered twenty-four men in a village not far distant. Upon this Canales declared what he called martial law, announcing that every American, armed and unarmed, and every Mexican living peaceably would be shot; and many were led by fear or a lust for plunder to take up arms.[4]
The American trains in particular seemed likely to be easy prey. As they commonly stretched out for some two miles and were guarded only—for so the character of the road usually dictated—at the ends, the Mexicans, trained to charge at full speed through an ordinary thicket, could readily attack them from ambush at about the middle point, create a stampede, and do a great deal of mischief. Infantry could not pursue the guerillas with success, and the number of our mounted men was always comparatively small, for every Mexican ranchero had at least one smart pony. In September, 1847, a band even attacked Mier. Governor Aguirre of Coahuila exerted himself particularly to organize forces of this character, and not only alcaldes but priests aided the cause.[4]
The American leaders, however, pursuing a course that was now conciliatory, now severe, and in many instances technically unjust, succeeded in coping with a system that was itself unjust. Taylor levied on the people of Nuevo Léon a tax of $96,000, the estimated value of the goods destroyed at Agua Negra, but suspended it indefinitely, when representative authorities proved the substantial innocence of the population and begged for mercy. Cavalry patrols and detachments pursuing culprits fairly wore out their horses. Villages, if even suspected of harboring thewere burned. Contributions were imposed wherever connivance appeared probable. By April, 1847, Canales was in despair.[5]
Then Wool determined to stamp out the evil, and announced in July that any guerillas caught by him would be executed. In December, 1847, he issued his famous Order 11, which not only made the Mexican authorities and their towns responsible for all damages done, but required them to hunt down theAguirre attempted to retaliate, but in vain. The Americans had power enough to carry out threats, whereas he had not; and he admitted his failure. Besides, the mass of the population were indolent in mind as well as body, and looked upon submission as preferable to danger. In February, 1848, finding the guilty rancheros were anxious to give up the business, Wool enabled them to resume peaceful occupations by declaring an amnesty, and in the following May he stated that the country had never before been so free from highway robbery.[5]
GUERILLAS IN VERA CRUZ STATE
In the south, Vera Cruz, a state of mountains, gorges, thickets and forests threaded with blind paths, was the chief home of the guerilla, and it looked as if Scott’s line of communication might be virtually destroyed. Not only many hardy, hot-blooded and unscrupulous natives, but a great many desperadoes hailing from Cuba were ready to enlist. After the fall of Vera Cruz, and still more after the battle of Cerro Gordo, a large number of regular officers, to say nothing of privates, could scarcely find bread, and some men, like the ex-divinity student, ex-Carlist, Jarauta—whose small, close beard, fierce black eyes, braided jacket, graceful cloak and gold-laced sombrero gave him a romantic air—had acquired in Spain a taste for this adventurous, reckless life; but a vastly greater number were prosaic felons, liberated from prison under a pledge to rob and murder. Nominally J. C. Rebolledo, a fine looking man of rather humane instincts, was the chief in this district, but the 800 or so persons belonging to many small bands, while occasionally acting more or less in concert, were mainly independent. The decree under which all goods coming from points occupied by the Americans were lawful booty opened possibilities of large gains, and Rebolledo’s capture of ten loaded wagons in April, 1847, set the people aflame with cupidity.[6]
Brevet Colonel McIntosh and his inexperienced officers, who left Vera Cruz for the interior—it will be recalled—about the first of June, 1847, with a well-advertised convoy including a large amount of specie, dependent on wild mustangs under raw, half-mutinous drivers largely ignorant of English, received the full benefit of this ambitious feeling. Near Tolomé and at Paso de Ovejas he lost men, wagons and pack-mules; and at the national bridge there was a genuine skirmish, in which a number of Americans were killed or wounded. Out of about 130 wagons twenty-four had to be abandoned in the low country; and a little way above Jalapa, though strongly reinforced, the troops had to fight again. General Pierce, who left Vera Cruz about six weeks later than McIntosh, had similar experiences. Early in August Major Lally set out from the coast with a few more than 1000 soldiers, two 6-pounders and sixty-four wagons. He lost no merchandise, but his four fights cost him nearly 100 men killed, wounded and missing; and Captain Wells, who followed Lally with some 200 recruits and additional ammunition, lost forty and had to retreat. These and other affairs proved that irregulars, favored by the geography of the region, were capable of doing substantial harm.[7]
But in Vera Cruz, as in every other quarter where they operated, though perhaps nowhere else in so marked a degree, the lack of morale, which enabled the guerilla system to exist, proved the cause of its failure. Poor arms, poor ammunition, poor marksmanship, and the want of artillery might have been remedied, or at least might have been offset by the counter-balancing advantages; but this defect was fatal. The Mexican guerillas were very different from what the guerillas of Spain had been. They fought like savages without the excuse of savages, for they knew better. Infuriated by their treacheries and cruelties, the Americans were persistent and unsparing in severity. Patrols who seemed never to sleep hunted out their nests in the mountains. On the march, flanking parties would force their way through the woods five miles or more from the road to catch them between two fires. The torch was applied with much liberality on suspicion, and sometimes on general principles, to huts and villages; and in the end a black swath of devastation, leagues in width, marked the route.[8]