by Mike Blakely
“Come on now, Ringgold,” he muttered to himself. “That’s enough. Get your little guns out of there.”
“Sir!” Bliss shouted. “The grass has caught fire near Duncan’s battery!”
The general tore his gaze away from Ringgold and looked toward Duncan, to the left. Flames were leaping, smoke spreading across the battleground. Maybe Ringgold could use the cover of this smoke to escape back to the relative safety of the American line.
Taylor narrowed his eyes as they swept right again. He strained to follow Old Branch through the thickening smoke. He blinked, and it seemed the mount and rider vanished. Then he saw the horse kicking on the ground. Men rushed to Ringgold’s aid. A Mexican ball had hit Old Branch. The gunners were in chaos, and Taylor feared the worst for the gallant Ringgold.
Captain
JAMES DUNCAN
Palo Alto
May 8, 1846
“Fire canister to the front!” Duncan yelled, standing in his stirrups, pointing toward the Tampico Battalion through the grass fire smoke. “Aim at their colors, Sergeant!” A flaming wad from the muzzle of one of his six-pounders had ignited the tall saw grass, but he intended to get off one last round before the enemy target became completely obscured by smoke.
For two hours his men had killed and maimed the foot soldiers on the Mexican side, constantly dodging the counterfire of the enemy artillery by hastily limbering, moving, unlimbering, firing. This was his first taste of battle, but his training had served him well. Don’t think about the dead men on the other side. Follow your orders. Do your duty. Like all of Ringgold’s men, he felt a need to prove the mettle of the flying artillery to General Taylor and was willing to risk life and limb to do so.
Now, through the black smoke, a dragoon came galloping on a large gray horse.
“Captain Duncan!” the messenger yelled. “Major Ringgold’s down!”
Duncan looked to the right, toward the place where he had last seen Ringgold’s battery. He found nothing but smoke. “What do you mean, he’s down?”
“A ball hit Old Branch. It hit Ringgold, too. Both his legs, broken at the thighs.”
This news staggered Duncan, but he would not let his alarm show. “Is he killed?”
“Not yet, but … He looked me right in the eye. He said, ‘Don’t stay with me. You have work to do. Go ahead.’”
Duncan attempted to peer through the smoke. “Where the devil is he, Sergeant?”
“He rode all the way to the enemy’s left flank to enfilade their line. His gunners are trying to hitch up and get him out of there.”
A strange lull had fallen across the battleground. The smoke from the crackling grass fire had clouded all artillery targets, and both sides had ceased to fire for the first time in hours. There was no sense in remaining here, Duncan thought. Taylor had given the company commanders of the flying artillery batteries much latitude in decision making. They would go where they deemed themselves most needed, without waiting for orders from above.
“Company! Limber!” He turned to the dragoon on the gray horse. “We’ll go to the aid of Major Ringgold.”
The dragoon nodded. “With your permission, sir, I’ll guide you there. There are a couple of boggy places to be avoided.”
“Very well.”
His men brought the horses around and hitched limbers to guns and caissons with a haste that filled Duncan with pride. Yet he reeled to think of Ringgold crippled and dying.
Just as he began moving toward Ringgold’s position, he heard—and felt—the rumble of many hooves coming from the left. He slowed his men.
“What the hell is that?” his gunnery sergeant said.
A gust lifted the smoke for an instant and Duncan caught a distant glimpse of a large body of enemy cavalry cantering toward the U.S. Army’s left flank. Now he knew he could not rush to the aid of Major Ringgold. If that cavalry assault got around the U.S. left flank, the Mexicans could capture the supply train.
“Turn about!” he yelled at his men. “To the left flank!” As his gunners wheeled, Duncan looked at the dragoon messenger. “Sergeant, go quickly. Tell General Taylor that our left flank is under attack by a battalion of enemy cavalry.”
“Yes, sir!” The man on the gray horse left at a gallop.
Duncan spurred his own mount and caught up with his men, quickly galloping past them to take the lead. Charging in front of the Eighth Infantry’s line, he rode all the way to the extreme left flank, where he pulled rein and raised a hand to stop his men. Swirling smoke still obscured him from the cavalry attack he knew to be approaching.
“Here!” he shouted. “Unlimber! With canister, load!”
“Sponge … Load … Ram … Sergeant, aim toward the timber at the far left of the battlefield!”
This was where he expected to see the Mexican cavalry appear, upwind of the grass fire smoke. The Eighth Infantry had been waiting to protect the left flank all day and probably knew nothing of the enemy cavalry charge bearing down on them through the cover of the smoke cloud.
“Prime!”
The rumble of hooves approached inside the smoke cloud. The cloud swirled toward Duncan’s battery, concealing the Mexicans. Now, within musket range, the smoke thinned to reveal the colorful tunics of the Mexican riders, the pennons fluttering under the blades of their lances. They were attacking in line formation perhaps four ranks deep, so they presented a broad target, impossible to miss. The sight, as it emerged from the cloud, almost enchanted Duncan with its grandeur. They were riding directly into his line of fire and still seemed unaware of his presence. His four fieldpieces sat loaded and ready to answer their attack.
“Hold your fire,” Duncan said. We must crush the forefront of that charge. “In battery, make ready … Fire!”
Gunners yanked on the lanyards that sparked the charges in the breeches of the guns. The six-pounders rocked back as they erupted and sent canister howling at the enemy horsemen. The four rounds of the first volley exploded just before the shells hit the ground in front of the charge, throwing horses and men back in a hail of lead balls.
“With canister, load!”
The second salvo fell in among the bunched cavalry mounts and blossomed with hellish smoke and lead. Two more rounds did similar damage. He thanked God for his lucky timing. He watched his men work with precision.
“Fire!”
The next four rounds completely staggered the enemy horsemen and sent them either tumbling to the ground or scrambling for the cover of timber to the left. Broken and bloody men and beasts lay still or floundered about on the battleground. Duncan’s artillery had changed the imagery from grand to ghastly in less than a minute. The power his guns wielded both emboldened and horrified him.
“Load canister and be ready, boys!” he ordered calmly. “They may yet charge again.”
Minutes passed. Saw grass burned. Smoke cleared. Captain Duncan caught sight of the cavalrymen retreating back to their lines through the cover of the timber.
“Looks like we whipped ’em, Captain,” said a young gunner, his eyes shining bright from his soot-darkened face.
Now Duncan thought about Major Ringgold flanking the Mexican left, enfilading their line. The brave move had won the commander a horrific wound. Duncan knew what he was going to do next, but he could not bring himself to speak it just yet. He was going to move forward and flank the Mexican right, as Ringgold had taken the left. It was the best way to draw the fire away from Ringgold’s position so that his men could get him and his guns out of there. At this moment, the enemy batteries were all trained on Ringgold. With the speed of the flying artillery, Duncan knew he could take the flank and unleash a modicum of hell on the Mexican line for a couple of minutes before the enemy gunners could swing their fieldpieces around and range him.
“Limber!” he ordered.
“Yes, sir!” his gunnery sergeant yelled. “Hook ’em up, boys! Where are we going, Captain?”
Duncan drew his sword and pointed it toward the fleeing enemy cava
lry. “There.”
General
MARIANO ARISTA
Palo Alto
May 8, 1846
General Arista blinked at the smoke stinging his eyes. Even the grass fire had benefited the Americans. Through that smoke cloud, he had heard the eruption of cannon and knew from the screams of horses and men that Colonel Cayetano Montero’s cavalry attack on the American left had been repulsed. The flying artillery of the famous Major Ringgold possessed impossible mobility. They fired and reloaded faster than men with muskets.
What else could go wrong?
Earlier, General Torrejon had failed on the left after charging needlessly through boggy ground. Why had he not held to the solid footing of the road? Meanwhile, the siege guns of the Americans had plowed great swaths of death and dismemberment through his infantry. His legendary Tampico Battalion had been decimated.
General Arista had ordered attacks that had never materialized. In one case, he knew it was because a messenger had been blown to bits by an exploding shell, but in other instances he suspected his junior officers simply ignored his directives. Did they want him to lose this battle so that he would be recalled and they could ascend? He found the depth of such treachery difficult to fathom. Finally, Montero had led a spirited assault from the right, only to be slammed back by cannon that had moved into place behind the cover of the smoke cloud. What more could possibly go awry?
“General!”
Arista turned to see a gory surgeon’s assistant stumbling toward him. A bloodstained hand presented a salute.
“Report!” he ordered.
“The chief surgeon has disappeared. He ordered us to move the field hospital farther back. We don’t know where he took the trunks.”
“What trunks?”
“The trunks with all the surgical tools and bandages and … and…” He threw his hands into the air, unable to find words.
Arista felt the frustration of the day boiling. “Find the coward! Find the trunks! Accomplish this, or you will answer to me!”
The medic nodded, saluted. “Yes, sir.”
“Take a horse.” He pointed to some cavalry mounts that had lost their riders and had wandered back to the lines.
“I will do my best, General.”
As the bloody medico stumbled wearily away, Arista thought of the wounded men awaiting attention. “Pobres diablos,” he whispered. Poor devils. It was a phrase he uttered often in war.
Now his attention turned to shouts coming from his right flank. A cannon belched smoke and a shell sailed into the beleaguered Tampico Battalion and exploded. Shrapnel sang past his ears as soldiers crumpled, corpse-like. Somehow, a battery of enemy artillery had emerged from the timber on the far right flank and unlimbered to enfilade his line. Four guns were now raining a devastating fire on his men, and all his artillery were aimed the wrong way.
Ringgold had hit him in the same way from the left. Counterfire had knocked Ringgold from his horse—about the only bit of luck to come Arista’s way today. But now, with his guns still trained on Ringgold’s battery to the left, another unit of flying artillery had succeeded in attacking his line from the right! Worse yet, he could see his infantry falling back in disarray. His right flank was crumbling.
“Bastante!” he yelled angrily. Spurring his mount and charging right, he stopped only to order a battery of his six-pounders to pivot about and find the range on the enemy guns.
“With what?” an indignant artillery officer replied. “We have no more ammunition.” He kicked an empty crate.
“Find more! Do your duty!”
Regaining his gallop in a single bound, Arista rode all along the front line as the American shells whistled overhead. Now he could see that Noriega’s shattered cavalry had retreated into the infantry and started a panic, and still the grape and canister flew through the troops like swarms of hornets.
Finally, he reined toward the rear to cut off the men who were falling back. “Alto!” he yelled at the conscripts. “Stand your ground! Load your muskets!” He used his boot and the weight of his mount to knock down the men who continued to flee. Yelling as he headed them off like a stampede of cattle, he was joined by a few subordinate officers trying to prevent an all-out rout.
Now he recognized the face of a reliable cavalry commander.
“Captain! Attack those enemy cannon with your lancers!”
“Yes, sir,” the captain answered. “But, sir, they have already limbered their guns and they are gone!”
“What?” He stood in his stirrups and saw the flying artillery dashing away. “Pursue them!”
“Yes, General!” The captain rode forward to gather his riders.
Arista turned to an infantry colonel he found shouting at his men to stand and fight. “Colonel, march on the enemy left. Follow the lancers. Now! Attack them!”
“Si, General!”
General Mariano Arista heard a great roll of drums swell up from the faraway American right, followed by the clarion ring of bugles. Taylor was going to charge the other end of his line! It was well that he had already ordered an attack on this end of the battlefield. Now he knew he must ride swiftly to the left and order his troops to fall back into the timber lest they become overrun by the Americans.
He spurred and felt the power of the steed carry him back toward the left. As he rode, he glanced at the sun dipping into the upper branches of the trees. This was no time to lose this battle, on the verge of twilight. He would let the Americans advance unopposed on his left. Perhaps his lancers could do some damage on the right.
Come quickly, nightfall. Tomorrow we will fight anew.
Brigadier General
ZACHARY TAYLOR
Palo Alto
May 8, 1846
It was like trying to watch a play with the stage curtain constantly going up and down. General Zachary Taylor had been unable to witness all of the maneuvers through the cloud of grass fire smoke that forever swirled, lifted, descended, thickened, and thinned. He had seen Duncan’s brilliant maneuver to protect the left flank with his battery, then marveled at the same captain’s courageous decision to advance all the way to Arista’s right flank.
That move had created the distraction that helped Ringgold’s men get him out of the mess he was in at the other end of the battlefield.
As he had watched Duncan vanish in a swirl of smoke on the left, General Zachary Taylor had ordered an advance of all his units on the right. Distracted by Duncan, Arista would never see it coming. General Twiggs was marching three infantry regiments forward now, accompanied by artillery and led by dragoons.
Ringgold had been hauled to the field hospital on a caisson trundling up the Matamoros Road. That hard-riding dragoon courier on the big gray horse had said that Ringgold’s wound was a bad one, with much flesh torn from both of his shattered thighs. Taylor hoped Ringgold would live long enough for him to express his pleasure in the performance of the flying artillery, in which the general had not, until today, held much confidence.
Now he was watching Captain Charles May of the Second Dragoons lead the charge on the right.
“That damn smoke,” he said to Bliss. “Can you see anything, Bill?”
Bliss lowered his spyglass. “Captain May didn’t get the dragoons close enough, sir. They rode up and fired their carbines, but they were not yet inside the effective range of the weapon.”
Taylor smirked at the way that every word Bliss spoke seemed to come right out of an army manual. “We must keep our eyes on Captain May in the future. Maybe he doesn’t judge distances well.”
Bliss had the spyglass at his eye again. “Nonetheless, sir, the enemy seems to be retreating from our advance on the right without opposition. They’re withdrawing into the timber.”
“Maybe Arista wants to fall back and lick his wounds overnight.”
“And live to fight another day?”
“Or maybe it’s a feint, and he has something planned on our left flank.”
Bliss’s spyglass and Tay
lor’s eyes swept together from the south to the east. He saw that the smoke had finally cleared from his left flank. Captain Duncan had returned, his battery intact, and had positioned himself on the left flank again. Then Taylor noticed the lancers approaching, followed by a regiment of infantry.
“Bill, get a note to Twiggs on the right. Tell him not to pursue the enemy into the timber. Tell him to capture the line the Mexican Army previously held but go no farther.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then get word to the Eighth Infantry on the left. Order them to hold that ground at all cost!”
Bliss was already scribbling the first note. “Yes, sir.”
For the first time today, Taylor found himself peering down on his battlefield from above—an impossible hawk’s-eye view. This had happened to him at Fort Harrison on the Wabash against Tecumsah, and again at Okeechobee, fighting the Seminoles. He now saw everything from on high. However unreal, the vision did not unsettle him. He thought of nothing beyond the battle beneath his gaze. From his merlin vantage, he could even see the future trajectory of the fight. Both lines—his and the enemy’s—were going to pivot counterclockwise but remain an equal distance apart. There, the day’s struggle would end. Darkness would fall. Victory—slim but sure—would be his.
Lieutenant
SAM GRANT
Palo Alto
May 8, 1846
Lieutenant Sam Grant had watched the carnage from a distance all day, like some ghoulish spectator. But now his regiment, the Fourth Infantry, had received orders to march forward. The enemy’s left flank was falling back, it seemed, and General Taylor wanted to occupy the ground the Mexicans were surrendering.
Drums rolled and fifes piped a march. As his company commander, Captain George A. McCall, gave the order, the fifty men in his unit began to advance. In an odd way, Grant felt something of a relief. Though sickened by what he saw as senseless death and mutilation, he had felt useless all day. As his men strode forward, he could see Mexican artillery still holding their ground, supported by some remnants of lancers and infantry.