The Army and Indian Removal
In the west, President Jackson told the Indians, “Your white brothers will not trouble you; they will have no claim to the land, and you can live upon it, you and all your children, as long as the grass grows or the water runs, in peace and plenty. It will be yours forever.” The president’s promise of a permanent Indian Territory was important in Indian removal, which meant trading land in the Louisiana Purchase to Indians living east of the Mississippi in exchange for their traditional homelands. After the War of 1812 the government informally pursued a removal policy until 1830, when Congress finally authorized the president to negotiate land-exchange treaties. Four years later Congress defined Indian country as land west of the Mississippi except for Louisiana, Missouri, and Arkansas. The government adopted removal as official policy for several reasons. Increased trans-Appalachian settlement made eastern territory more desirable, while humanitarians, motivated by an arrogant paternalism, argued that removal would save the Indians from extinction, the inevitable fate for people who resisted “superior” white civilization.
The Army had several duties under the removal policy. Initially civilian contractors organized Indian traveling parties, but they were so corrupt that in 1832 the secretary of war assigned these tasks to the Army. Army personnel helped the emigrants settle in their new lands and protected them from the Plains Indians. Operating from forts along the border of Indian country, the bluecoats tried to preserve peace between whites and Indians. Most important, when Indians resisted removal, the Army went to war. Removal was supposedly voluntary and a few tribes went west without opposition, but most preferred to remain. To persuade them to emigrate, Jackson employed wholesale fraud and deception, and when chicanery failed, he used force. In 1836 three Creek bands went on the warpath, but more than 11,000 regulars, citizen-soldiers, and friendly Creeks quickly ended the resistance. When most Cherokees also opposed removal, force again compelled submission.
Although the Creek and Cherokee troubles were hardly wars, removal did provoke two genuine conflicts, the Black Hawk War and the Second Seminole War. The Sac and Fox tribes occupied prime Illinois real estate, and in 1827 the state petitioned the War Department for the Indians’ removal. When nothing had been done by 1831, Governor John Reynolds mobilized volunteers and forced Black Hawk, an aged Sac chief, to sign an agreement to stay west of the Mississippi. But during the winter Black Hawk received false assurances of assistance from Canada and from other tribes. In April 1832 he and his followers, including women and children, recrossed the river. The resulting war was a deadly farce, “a tissue of blunders,” as one colonel called it. Learning that he would receive no British or Indian support, Black Hawk tried to surrender three times, but on each occasion the whites rejected the peace overture. The Black Hawk War ended in early August at the so-called “Battle of Bad Axe,” where the whites slaughtered men, women, and children.
Seminole removal was more difficult. The United States first tangled with the Seminoles in 1817–1818 when Jackson, under War Department orders, invaded Florida. The motives behind the invasion were complex. Seminoles were raiding the Georgia frontier and escaping to safety under the Spanish flag, and Spanish authorities appeared powerless to restrain them. Florida was also a sanctuary for escaped slaves, who participated in the Indian forays. The hope of extending United States territory and removing a proximate foreign influence reinforced the desire to eliminate the sanctuary and recapture the slaves. With typical zeal, Jackson destroyed Indian villages, captured Spanish towns, and deposed the Spanish governor. Although Jackson eventually withdrew from Florida, Spain realized it would ultimately lose the territory and decided to negotiate. The Adams-Onis Treaty, ratified in 1821, ceded Florida to the United States. The Seminoles also negotiated, signing a treaty in 1823 calling for them to concentrate on a reservation in central Florida. Few had done so by the early 1830s, and Jackson’s administration negotiated new treaties, which it claimed obligated the Seminoles to emigrate. The Indians maintained the treaties were invalid.
When the Second Seminole War began in December 1835, defeating the Seminoles seemed relatively easy. Fewer than 5,000 Indians lived in Florida, and the 1,200 warriors often fought with bows and arrows. Several factors made the task difficult, and the war became the Army’s longest, most costly Indian conflict. The terrain and climate proved formidable, and the black fugitives stiffened Seminole resistance. Removal for the Indians meant a new western home, but blacks feared they would be returned to slavery. The Seminoles and their black allies were adept guerrillas. A frustrated War Department even authorized the use of bloodhounds to track the elusive Indians, prompting an antiwar congressman to ask for a report on the “natural, political, and martial history of bloodhounds, showing the peculiar fitness of that class of warriors to be associates of the gallant army of the United States.”
Eight commanders tried to remove the Seminoles. Although their cumulative effect was to sap Seminole strength, by the time the eighth commander, Colonel William J. Worth, took charge in April 1841 the war seemed interminable. Determined to end the conflict, Worth conducted the war ruthlessly. With more than 5,000 regulars under his command, he launched the war’s first summer campaign, preventing the Seminoles from raising and harvesting their crops. The regulars suffered a high incidence of disease, but striking at the Indians’ villages and means of subsistence reduced the Seminole population to about 250 by the next spring. President John Tyler sent Congress a special message saying “further pursuit of these miserable beings by a large military force seems to be as injudicious as it is unavailing.” He authorized Worth to proclaim the war ended, which the colonel did in August 1842. The original goal of complete removal had not been achieved despite great manpower and monetary costs. Approximately 10,000 regulars and 30,000 citizen-soldiers served, at a cost of more than 1,500 deaths and $20 million. Yet enough Seminoles remained to wage a comparatively minor Third Seminole War during the 1850s.
By the mid-1840s Indian removal was nearly completed. In 1820 an estimated 125,000 Indians were living east of the Mississippi; twenty-five years later fewer than 30,000 remained. But removal of the eastern Indians did not end Indian-white conflicts. After the Mexican War white settlement reached the Great Plains and leaped across the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific coast, igniting new confrontations. Between 1850 and 1861 the Army clashed with the Sioux, Cheyennes, Kiowas, and Comanches on the Plains; with the Apaches, Navajos, and Utes in the deserts and mountains of the southwest; and with the Yakimas, Rogues, Walla Wallas, and other small tribes in the Pacific northwest. Despite Jackson’s promise, no Indian territory was permanent. Most whites believed they needed the entire west in order to fulfill the nation’s Manifest Destiny.
The Mexican War, 1846–1848
The “re-occupation of Oregon and the re-annexation of Texas at the earliest practicable period,” read the 1844 Democratic Party platform, “are great American measures.” This shrewdly contrived plank appealed to both southern and northern expansionists and averted charges of imperialism by implying that the United States had once occupied Oregon and owned Texas, neither of which was true. Despite the political opportunism and historical fabrication, the plank captured the spirit of Manifest Destiny sweeping the nation and expressed the avid expansionism of the Democratic presidential candidate, James K. Polk. Polk interpreted his narrow election victory as a mandate to acquire Oregon and Texas, as well as California and New Mexico. Pursuit of these territorial ambitions almost provoked a two-front war. Britain, whose claim to Oregon was as good as America’s, resented Polk’s assertion that the United States had a “clear and unquestionable” right to all Oregon. It seemed that a third Anglo-American war might explode over Oregon, but a powerful England could accept a compromise without loss of dignity and, despite some vociferous Democratic sentiment for all Oregon, so could Polk. In June 1846 the two nations split Oregon by extending the 49th Parallel to the Pacific.
The settlement with England
was fortunate because the United States had gone to war with Mexico the previous month. Many issues soured United States-Mexican relations, but the war began over Texas, which had gained independence in a brief but bitter war in 1835–1836. The United States and other nations recognized the new country, but Mexico refused to accept the results of the Texas revolution and warned the United States that it would consider annexation an act of war. When the United States annexed Texas in 1845, Mexico broke diplomatic relations and threatened reprisals against Texas. A final diplomatic effort by Polk delayed hostilities, but war was inevitable after annexation. Mexico believed it could not accept territorial dismemberment and maintain national honor. Determined to have Texas and the Mexican provinces of New Mexico and California, Polk was willing to fight for them.
The question of Texas’s southern boundary aggravated the annexation issue. Texas claimed the Rio Grande, but Mexico insisted the Nueces River was the border. Accepting the Texans’ interpretation, Polk ordered Brigadier General Zachary Taylor to assume a position “on or near” the Rio Grande. Taylor stopped at Corpus Christi at the mouth of the Nueces, which was neither on nor very near the Rio Grande, but Polk acquiesced. However, on January 12, 1846, Polk learned his special envoy had failed to persuade Mexico to accept the Rio Grande boundary and to sell New Mexico and California. The next day he ordered Taylor to the Rio Grande. By late March the general’s Army of Occupation had concentrated opposite Matamoros. From Polk’s perspective Taylor had assumed a forward defensive position; the Mexicans considered Taylor’s advance an invasion.
In late April the Mexican commander, Major General Mariano Arista, sent his cavalry across the Rio Grande, and some of his horsemen ambushed two dragoon squadrons. Unbeknownst to either Arista or Taylor, Mexico’s president had already declared a “defensive war,” and even before Polk learned of the incident, he had also decided on war. On May 9 Polk told his cabinet that he wanted to send Congress a war message. Taylor’s report of the ambush arrived that evening, and with unanimous cabinet approval Polk delivered his message on May 11. Mexico, he said, “has passed the boundary of the United States, has invaded our territory, and shed American blood on American soil.” War, Polk insisted, “exists by the act of Mexico herself.” Although these assertions were half-truths, the United States declared war on May 13.
Two major battles had already occurred. On the last day of April Arista’s army crossed the Rio Grande, and on May 8 it confronted Taylor at Palo Alto. Taylor told his men “that their main dependence must be in the bayonet,” but American artillery bore the brunt of the battle and forced the Mexicans to withdraw. Just south of Palo Alto the open prairie gave way to dense chaparral sliced by ancient river beds known as resacas. At Resaca de la Palma, Arista’s army assumed a strong defensive position. The tangled growth made it difficult for American artillery to deploy, and the resaca formed a natural breastwork. The battle was a melee as the chaparral shattered unit cohesion. The Mexicans again lost and were sent fleeing across the Rio Grande. In two battles Taylor’s smaller army had inflicted 800 casualties and sustained fewer than 200.
The battles stunned Mexico, which believed it would win the war. Many leading Mexicans judged the United States politically and militarily weak. Slavery and the tariff were such divisive issues that some Mexicans thought that northern states would not aid the south in a war against Mexico. Two fifth-column elements would make a war difficult for the gringos: Slaves would rebel, and Indians would seek revenge for removal. The U.S. regular Army was small, and Mexican officials considered citizen-soldiers worthless. Even if Americans mounted an offensive, logistical support would be impossible across Mexico’s arid expanses. An amphibious invasion would confront tempestuous waters, bad roads leading inland, and Mexico’s staunch lowland ally, yellow fever. By contrast, Mexico seemed powerful. European observers considered its armed forces superb, an opinion shared by most Mexicans. Privateers would swarm to sea, feasting upon American commerce. Mexico also believed it would receive European aid, especially from England, since an Anglo-American war over Oregon seemed imminent. “We have more than enough strength to make war,” exhorted the editors of La Vox del Pueblo. “Let us make it, then, and victory will perch upon our banners.”
The only accurate aspect of Mexico’s assessment was its belief that the war would divide American society. Antiwar movements—Loyalists during the Revolution, Republicans in the Quasi-War, and Federalists in 1812—had become traditional, and the Mexican War was no exception. Four major groups criticized the conflict. Abolitionists believed the war was a southern plot to extend slavery. Pacifists argued that war violated every Christian principle and that “false and pernicious principles,” such as “our country, right or wrong,” had subverted the people’s moral character. Whig politicians believed Polk had provoked Mexico in order to launch an imperialistic invasion. A small group of “Conscience” Whigs voted against military appropriations, but the larger number of “Cotton” Whigs, though critical of the war, affirmed their loyalty by praising American soldiers, eulogizing their commanders, and voting for the men and money Polk requested. By denouncing “Mr. Polk’s War” while loyally supporting it, the Whig Party avoided political suicide. Democratic followers of expresident Martin Van Buren and of John C. Calhoun, now a South Carolina senator, joined their Whig opponents in castigating the war. Van Burenites disliked Polk and opposed the expansion of slavery. Calhoun hoped his stand would lead to the presidency in 1848 but feared the impact of slavery’s expansion on the nation’s political stability. He also thought the seemingly unrestrained war power Polk exercised was unconstitutional, presaging a dangerous consolidation of power in the executive branch.
The antiwar movement had little impact. Diverse critics never united, and no civil rights issue allowed militant dissenters to become martyrs. Since military service was voluntary and government loans rather than direct federal taxes financed the war, activists could not resist a draft or refuse to pay taxes. Nor could they decry government censorship: Polk never suppressed critics despite their vicious attacks on him. However, the president questioned his critics’ loyalty. He referred to the Whigs as “Federalists” and claimed the antiwar agitation encouraged the enemy, thus protracting the war.
Although Polk had no military experience, he acted as not only commander in chief but also as coordinator in chief for the war effort. In the country’s first example of prewar strategic planning, after consulting with his cabinet Polk had contingency war plans drafted more than six months before Arista’s cavalry attacked Taylor’s dragoons north of the Rio Grande. Once the war began he exercised tight control over every aspect of it, setting precedents that subsequent presidents built upon to make the White House, not the Capitol, the center of wartime authority. No problem perplexed Polk as much as the senior Army commanders, Scott and Taylor, who were as different as their nicknames implied. “Old Rough and Ready” Taylor rarely wore a uniform and had limited strategic and tactical abilities. His interest in military intelligence and planning for campaigns was so deficient that Scott assigned Captain William W. S. Bliss as his chief staff officer. Considered the Army’s brightest intellect, “Perfect” Bliss would compensate for Taylor’s own conception of warfare, which rarely went beyond marching, firing, and charging. Taylor’s strength was his battlefield imperturbability. Sitting atop Old Whitey, one leg crossed over the pommel and chewing on a straw, he never panicked. “Old Fuss and Feathers” Scott, who became the commanding general in 1841, loved fancy uniforms and had considerable strategic and tactical abilities. Although not a West Pointer, he had a keen interest in military affairs, read widely on the subject, and wrote tactical manuals. A meticulous planner, he insisted upon a thorough military reconnaissance before maneuvering or fighting.
Taylor and Scott were both Whigs with presidential ambitions. Since Polk had no desire to win the war with a Whig general who might capitalize on his military reputation to become president, he tried to circumvent them. He proposed creatin
g the position of lieutenant general, last held by Washington, and intended to nominate an ardent Democrat for the post. But Congress refused to establish the lieutenant generalcy, and so Polk waged war with commanding officers whom he distrusted. The generals feared a conspiracy to deprive them of success and felt, as Scott put it, doubly endangered by “a fire upon my rear, from Washington, and the fire, in front, from the Mexicans.”
Polk oversaw many details of manpower mobilization. Three options were available, one being to call out the common militia. When the war began, Taylor, with War Department authorization, called out 1,390 three-month militia; and General Edmund P. Gaines, without authority, mobilized 11,211 more for six months. Also, on May 13, 1846, Congress extended the militia’s term of service from three to six months and authorized the president to call militiamen into service, although no one believed the nation could rely on common militia. Even a six-month term was too brief for a distant conflict, and the constitutional question about foreign service remained. Most of the militiamen mobilized by Taylor and Gaines were demobilized before they did any fighting.
Another possibility was to increase the regular Army. In the War of 1812 Congress created many new regiments, forming an impressive paper army. However, the understrength units composed of raw men and officers usually lacked proficiency. The government avoided repeating this mistake because after the Seminole War the Army had been reduced to 8,600 men along expansible lines, eliminating privates but not regiments. In May 1846 Congress authorized Polk to increase the number of privates, doubling the Army’s authorized strength. New recruits, placed among veteran soldiers and under experienced officers, soon marched and fought like veterans themselves. Only in February 1847 did Congress vote for ten additional regiments.
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