In 1812 he was made Captain, and had the command of a block-house and stockade called Fort Harrison, on the Wabash river, soon after the declaration of war against England. This place was attacked by a strong body of Indians. Captain Taylor with less than fifty men, defended it with vigor and success. In consequence of his services on that occasion, he was promoted to the rank of Brevet Major. During the rest of the war, he continued in service on the frontiers, and seems to have done his duty faithfully as a soldier.
After the war was over, in 1815, the army was diminished to a peace establishment, and Major Taylor reduced to the rank of Captain. In consequence of this, he withdrew from the army, but, after a few months, returned, and was then, or subsequently, restored to his former rank as Major. For several years he was employed in such various military services, in the west and south-west, as must be performed in a time of peace. In 1819 he was made Lieutenant-Colonel. In 1832 he became Colonel, and in that year, with a command of four hundred men, he served under General Atkinson, in the expedition against the Sacs and other Indians led by the celebrated Black Hawk. Afterwards he was intrusted with the command of Fort Crawford, where he remained till 1836, when he was ordered to Florida, to fight against the Seminole Indians.
It was here that he made use of the bloodhounds to hunt the poor savages from their hiding-places in the woods. You know what Mr. Pitt once said of the Spanish use of this weapon in the sixteenth century, but the animals imported from Cuba, where they had been trained to hunt runaway slaves, were of no value when put upon the track of red men. I do not know who originated the scheme of employing the bloodhounds. It has often been ascribed to General Taylor, and with good reason, I believe, has it been denied that he was the author of that plan. It was of no great honor to the nation, let who would invent it; and few men will be sorry that it did not turn out well.
It was thought Colonel Taylor displayed a good deal of skill, in contending with the Indians in Florida, and, accordingly, he was made Brevet Brigadier-General, in 1838. After finishing the conquest of the Indians, he left Florida, in 1840. It is said that fighting against the Indians is a good school for a soldier. General Taylor served long at this work, and served faithfully. In the Florida war, his conduct as General is said to have been noble.
In 1840, he was made Commander of that portion of the American army in the south-west of the United States, and in 1841, removed his family from Kentucky to Baton Rouge, in Louisiana, which has since been his home. In 1845 he was ordered to Texas, and had command of the "Army of Occupation," and subsequently of the "Army of Invasion." In the war against Mexico, it is thought by competent judges that he displayed a good deal of military skill. He was beloved by his soldiers, and seems to have won their confidence, partly by success, partly by military talent, but also in part by his character, which was frank, honest, just and unpretending. I have heard of no instance in the whole war, in which cruelty is chargeable upon him. Several anecdotes are related of his kindliness, generosity, and openness of heart. No doubt they are true. War is a bloody trade; it makes one shudder to think of it in its terrible details; but the soldier is not necessarily a malignant or a cruel man; that bloody and profane command, so well known, uttered in the heat of conflict, when the battle seemed to waver, does not imply any peculiar cruelty or ill-will. It is only one of the accidents of war, which shows more clearly what its substance is.
I am no judge of warlike operations and of military skill, and therefore shall not pretend to pass judgment on matters which I know I do not understand; I shall not inquire as to the military value of the laurels he won at Resaca de la Palma, at Monterey, and at Buena Vista. But, in our judgment, we ought to remember one circumstance: that is, the inferiority of the Mexicans. They were beaten, I think, in every considerable battle throughout the whole war; no matter who commanded. General Scott landed at Vera Cruz, captured the city, and the far-famed Castle of St. Juan d'Ulloa, garrisoned by four thousand three hundred and ninety soldiers, and the American loss amounted to thirteen men killed, and sixty-three hurt! General Scott took possession of the great port of the nation, with less than twenty thousand soldiers, with only about fifteen thousand troops; marched nearly two hundred miles into the interior, fighting his way, and garrisoning the road behind him, sometimes even subsisting his army in the country which he conquered as he went on; and finally took the capital, a city with nearly two hundred thousand inhabitants, with less than six thousand soldiers. Suppose an army of that size were to land at Newburyport, with the intention of marching to Worcester, not two hundred miles, but only fifty or sixty, how many do you think would ever reach the spot? Why, suppose the American men did nothing, there are women enough in Massachusetts to throw every soldier into the Merrimac!
I do not believe that this inferiority of the Mexican arises so much from the superior bravery of the Americans; almost any male animal will fight on small provocation; your Mexican male, as well as your American, on as small provocation, and as desperately. But the American soldier was always well armed, furnished with every thing that modern science makes terrible in war; well clad, well fed, well paid, he went voluntarily to the work. The Mexicans were ill armed, ill clad, ill fed, often not paid at all, and sometimes brought to fight against their will.
The difference does not end here: the main reliance of the Mexican government, the regular soldiers, the Presidiales, were men who seemed to have most of the vices of old garrison soldiers, with most of the faults of new recruits; or, as another has said, himself a soldier in the war, "All the vices engendered in a garrison life; all the cowardice which their constant defeats by the Indians had created; all the laziness contracted in an idle monotonous existence, and very little military skill." The new levies came unwillingly, and were often only "food for powder." On the American side was a small body of veteran soldiers, low and coarse men—it is the policy of America to have the rank and file of our army in peace composed usually of such—but full of brute courage; accustomed to all sorts of hardships and exposure; under a discipline rigorous and almost perfect; wonted to danger, and weaned from fear; careless of life almost to desperation; full of confidence in their commander, and of contempt for their foe. The volunteers brought with them the characteristic ardor of Americans, their confidence of success, their contempt of toil and of danger; familiar with fire-arms from their youth, they soon learned the discipline of the camp.
You see what a difference this makes between the two armies; but the chief superiority of the American soldiers was this—they came from a country where there is a complete national unity of action. So the government could trust the army, and the army the government; the soldiers had confidence in their commander, confidence in their country, confidence in their cause; while the Mexicans had no national unity of action, the people little confidence in the government, the government as little in the people; the nation but little trust in the army, and the army little in the nation; the soldiers had great fear of the enemy, little faith in their officers, and the officers little in their men. Did you ever see a swarm of bees when the queen bee was dead, and moths had invaded the hive? The Mexicans were much in the same state. The result was what had readily been foreseen: at the battle of Buena Vista, on the one side, there were twenty-one thousand five hundred and fifty-three Mexicans; on the other, four thousand seven hundred and fifty-nine American soldiers, of which only four hundred and seventy-six were regulars. Yet the American loss, in killed, wounded and missing, was but seven hundred and forty-six, while that of the Mexican army was nearly two thousand men lost. If the Mexicans had done the same proportionate execution, every American would have been killed long before night.
All these things ought to be taken into account, in making up our mind about the difficulty of the enterprise. Still, after this allowance is made, it must be confessed the American invasion of Mexico was a remarkable undertaking, distinguished for its boldness, not to say its rashness, and almost unparalleled in the history of modern wars. It certainly did require great coolness, courage, and prudence, on the part of General Taylor, to conduct his part of the expedition. He had those qualities, but it has not yet been proved or shown to be probable, that he had the nobler qualities which make a great General. The kind of warfare he was engaged in, does not bring to light the high qualities of a man like Gustavus Adolphus, Frederick the Great, or Napoleon. Perhaps General Taylor had them, but they did not appear.