Matthew Calbraith Perry: A Typical American Naval Officer

by William Elliot Griffis

Here then was “the accumulated science of ages” on the plains of Vera Cruz applied to the naval art, and directed against the doomed city, erected by one of the greatest engineers of the age, Robert E. Lee, with ordnance served by the ablest naval artillerists of the world, the pupils of the leading officer of the American navy, Matthew C. Perry. Most of them had been trained under his eye at the Sandy Hook School of Gun Practice. They were now to turn their knowledge into account. Not a single random shot was fired.

The exact range of each of the familiar guns was known, and the precise distance to the nearest and more distant forts. The points to be aimed at had been mathematically determined by triangulation before a piece was fired. Shortly before 10 a. m. on the 24th of March, while the last gun mounted was being sponged and cleared of sand, the cannon of Santa Barbara opened with a fire so well aimed that it was clear that the battery was discovered. A few daring volunteers sprang out of the embrasures to clear away the brush and unmask the work. The chapparal was well chopped away to give free range to the officers who sighted the pieces, the aim being for the walls below the flag-pole. The direct and cross fire of seven forts soon converged on the sandbags, and the castle sent ten- and thirteen-inch shells flying over and around. When one of these fell inside, all dropped down to the ground. For the first five minutes the air seemed to be full of missiles, but our men after a little practice at houses and flag-staffs soon settled down to their work to do their best with navy guns. One lucky shot by Lieutenant Baldwin severed the flag-staff of Santa Barbara; at which, all hands mounted the parapet and gave three cheers. In order to allow free sweep to the big guns, the embrasures had been made large, thus offering a tempting target to the enemy.

The Mexicans were good heavy artillerists, but their shot was lighter than ours. Some of them were killed by their own balls which had been picked out of the sandbags by the Americans and fired back. Their strongest and best served battery was that fronting on the one worked by our sailors. The navy was here pitted against the navy, for the commander on the city side was Lieutenant of Marines D. Sebastian Holzinger, a German and an officer of several year’s service in the Mexican navy. He was as brave as he was capable; and when his flag-staff had been cut away, he and a young assistant leaped into the space outside, seized the flag and in sight of the Americans, nailed it to the staff again. A ball from the naval battery at the same moment striking the parapet, Holzinger and his companion were nearly buried in rubbish.

Within the city the Mexican soldiers, who had before found shelter in their bomb-proof places of retreat from the mortar bombs falling vertically into the streets, did not relish and could not hold out against missiles sent directly through the walls into their barracks and places of refuge. The Paixhans shells hit exactly among soldiers, and not into churches among women. It is said that when the Mexican engineers in the city picked up the solid thirty-two pounder shot and one of the unexploded eight-inch shells, they decided at once that the city must fall.

In spite of the hammering which the sand battery received, no material injury to its walls was done, and what there was was easily repaired at night. Captains Lee and Williams were willing to show faith in their own work, and remained in the redoubt during the fire. At 2.30 p. m. the ammunition was exhausted, and the heated ordnance was allowed to cool. The last gun fired was a double-shotted one of the Potomac. Captain Aulick wishing to send a despatch to Commodore Perry, Midshipman Fauntleroy volunteered to take it, and though the Mexicans were playing with all their artillery, he arrived safely on the beach and Perry received tidings of progress.

The embrasures were filled up with sandbags, and the garrison sat under the parapet, awaiting the relief party which approached about 4 o’clock. The Mexicans, who had been driven away from their guns, now finding the Americans silent, opened with redoubled vigor which made the approaching reinforcements watch the air keenly for the black spots which were round shots.

The result of the first day’s use of the navy guns was, that fifty feet of the city walls built of coquina or shell-rock, the curtains of the redoubt to right and left, were cut away. A great breach was made, about thirty-six feet wide, sufficient for a storming party to enter; while the thicker masonry of the forts was drilled like a colander. These breaches were partly filled at night by sandbags.

The relief party led by Captain Mayo reached the battery at sunset, and after a good supper, fell to sound sleep, during which time, the engineers repaired the parapet. It was a beautiful starlight night. The time for the chirping of the tropical insects had come, and they were awakening vigorously to their summer concerts. All night long the mortars, like geyser springs of fire, kept up their rhythmic flow of iron and flame. The great star-map of the heavens seemed scratched over with parabolas of red fire, the streaks of which were watched with delight by the soldiers, and with tremor by the beleagured people in the city.

At daylight the boatswain’s silver whistle called the men to rise, and the day’s work soon after breakfast began in earnest. The sailors manned their guns, firing so steadily that between seven and eight o’clock it was necessary to let the iron tubes cool. At 7 a. m. another army battery, of four twenty-fours and two eight-inch Paixhans being finished, joined in the roar. Their fire was rapid, but the dense growth of chapparal hid their objective points from view making good aim impossible, so that the damage done was not strikingly evident.

The castle garrison had now gained the exact range of the naval battery, and thirteen-inch shell from the castle began to fall all around and close to the sandbags throwing up loose showers of soil. One dropped within the battery but upon exploding, hurt no one. The round shot from the city forts were continually grazing the parapets, and it was while Midshipman T. D. Shubrick was levelling his gun and pointing it at a tower in one of the forts, that a round shot entered the embrasure instantly killing him. During the two days, four sailors were killed, mostly by solid shot in the head or chest; while five officers and five men were wounded, mostly by chapparal splinters of yucca, or cactus thorns and spurs, and fragments of sandbags.