A Gallant Little Army

by Timothy D Johnson

  3. The good of the service, the honor of the United States and the interests of humanity, imperiously demand that every crime, enumerated above, should be severely punished.

  4. But the written code, as above, commonly called the rules and articles of war, does not provide for the punishment of any one of those crimes, even when committed by individuals of the army upon the persons or property of other individuals of the same, except in the very restricted case in the 9th of those articles; nor for like outrages, committed by the same class of individuals, upon the persons or property of a hostile country, except very partially, in the 51st, 52d, and 55th articles; and the same code is absolutely silent as to all injuries which may be inflicted upon individuals of the army, or their property, against the laws of war, by individuals of a hostile country.

  5. It is evident that the 99th article, independent of any reference to the restriction in the 87th, is wholly nugatory in reaching any one of those high crimes.

  6. For all the offences, therefore, enumerated in the second paragraph above, which may be committed abroad—in, by, or upon the army, a supplemental code is absolutely needed.

  7. That unwritten code is Martial Law, as an addition to the written military code, prescribed by Congress in the rules and articles of war, and which unwritten code, all armies, in hostile countries, are forced to adopt—not only for their own safety, but for the protection of the unoffending inhabitants and their property, about the theatres of military operations, against injuries, on the part of the army, contrary to the laws of war.

  8. From the same supreme necessity, martial law is hereby declared as a supplemental code in, and about, all cities, towns, camps, posts, hospitals, and other places which may be occupied by any part of the forces of the United States, in Mexico, and in, and about, all columns, escorts, convoys, guards, and detachments, of the said forces, while engaged in prosecuting the existing war in, and against the said republic, and while remaining within the same.

  9. Accordingly, every crime, enumerated in paragraph No. 2, above, whether committed—1. By any inhabitant of Mexico, sojourner or traveller therein, upon the person or property of any individual of the United States forces, retainer or follower of the same; 2. By any individual of the said forces, retainer or follower of the same, upon the person or property of any inhabitant of Mexico, sojourner or traveller therein; or 3. By any individual of the said forces, retainer or follower of the same, upon the person or property of any other individual of the said forces, retainer or follower of the same—shall be duly tried and punished under the said supplemental code.

  10. For this purpose it is ordered, that all offenders, in the matters aforesaid, shall be promptly seized, confined, and reported for trial, before military commissions, to be duly appointed as follows:

  11. Every military commission, under this order, will be appointed, governed, and limited, as nearly as practicable, as prescribed by the 65th, 66th, 67th, and 97th, of the said rules and articles of war, and the proceedings of such commissions will be duly recorded, in writing, reviewed, revised, disapproved or approved, and the sentences executed—all, as near as may be, as in the cases of the proceedings and sentences of courts martial, provided, that no military commission shall try any case clearly cognizable by any court martial, and provided, also, that no sentence of a military commission shall be put in execution against any individual belonging to this army, which may not be, according to the nature and degree of the offence, as established by evidence, in conformity with known punishments, in like cases, in some one of the States of the United States of America.

  12. The sale, waste or loss of ammunition, horses, arms, clothing or accoutrements, by soldiers, is punishable under the 37th and 38th articles of war. Any Mexican or resident or traveller, in Mexico, who shall purchase of any American soldier, either horse, horse equipments, arms, ammunition, accoutrements or clothing, shall be tried and severely punished, by a military commission, as above.

  13. The administration of justice, both in civil and criminal matters, through the ordinary courts of the country, shall nowhere and in no degree, be interrupted by any officer or soldier of the American forces, except, 1. In cases to which an officer, soldier, agent, servant, or follower of the American army may be a party; and 2. In political cases—that is, prosecutions against other individuals on the allegations that they have given friendly information, aid or assistance to the American forces.

  14. For the ease and safety of both parties, in all cities and towns occupied by the American army, a Mexican police shall be established and duly harmonized with the military police of the said forces.

  15. This splendid capital—its churches and religious worship; its convents and monasteries; its inhabitants and property are, moreover, placed under the special safeguard of the faith and honor of the American army.

  16. In consideration of the foregoing protection, a contribution of $150,000 is imposed on this capital, to be paid in four weekly instalments of thirty-seven thousand five hundred dollars ($37,500) each, beginning on Monday next, the 20th instant, and terminating on Monday, the 11th of October.

  17. The Ayuntamiento, or corporate authority of the city, is specially charged with the collection and payment of the several instalments.

  18. Of the whole contributions to be paid over to this army, twenty thousand dollars shall be appropriated to the purchase of extra comforts for the wounded and sick in hospital; ninety thousand dollars ($90,000) to the purchase of blankets and shoes for gratuitous distribution among the rank and file of the army, and forty thousand dollars ($40,000) reserved for other necessary military purposes.

  19. This order will be read at the head of every company of the United States’ forces, serving in Mexico, and translated into Spanish for the information of Mexicans.

  Notes

  Abbreviations

  DRTL

  Daughters of the Republic of Texas Library, San Antonio

  BLY

  Beinecke Library, Yale University, New Haven, Conn.

  FHS

  Filson Historical Society, Louisville, Ky.

  LAC

  Latin-American Collection

  LC

  Library of Congress

  LR

  Letters Received

  NA

  National Archives

  RG

  Record Group

  SHC

  Southern Historical Collection

  SW

  Secretary of War

  TSLA

  Tennessee State Library and Archives, Nashville

  UNC

  University of North Carolina

  USMA

  United States Military Academy, West Point, N.Y.

  UT

  University of Texas, Austin

  UTA

  University of Texas, Arlington

  VHS

  Virginia Historical Society, Richmond

  Prologue

  1. Carl von Clausewitz, On War, trans. and ed. Michael Howard and Peter Paret (Princeton. N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1976), 119.

  2. Moses Barnard Reminiscences, BLY; Winfield Scott, Memoirs of Lieut.-General Scott, 2 vols. (1864; Freeport, N.Y.: Books for Libraries Press, 1970), 2:573.

  3. Clark to John (brother), Jan. 19, 1848, N. H. Clark Papers, University of Missouri, Columbia.

  4. Gardner to brother, Nov. 23, 1847, William Montgomery Gardner Papers, SHC, UNC.

  5. For a thorough discussion of this theme, see Ernest Lee Tuveson, Redeemer Nation: The Idea of America’s Millennial Role (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968), esp. chap. 4.

  6. Clark to John, Jan. 19, 1848, N. H. Clark Papers.

  Chapter 1. Veracruz: The Gibraltar of Mexico

  1. J. Frost, The Mexican War and Its Warriors (New Haven, Conn.: H. Mansfield, 1850), 129–30; Israel Uncapher Mexican War Diary, UTA; Chauncey Forward Sargent, Gathering Laurels in Mexico: The Diary of an American Soldier in the Mexican American War, ed. Ann Brown Janes (Lincoln, Mass.: C
ottage Press, 1990), 5; William G. Temple, “Memoir,” in Philip Syng Physick Conner, The Home Squadron under Commodore Connor in the War with Mexico (Philadelphia: Philip Syng Physick Conner, 1896), 60; “The Siege of Vera Cruz,” Southern Quarterly Review (Jul. 1851). The landing craft were built in lengths of 35 feet 9 inches, 37 feet 9 inches, and 40 feet to facilitate stacking on board the transports. To illustrate that cost overruns are nothing new to the U.S. military, the amount paid for each boat was quadruple the original contract price. For an excellent treatment of the weapons used in the Mexican War, see Richard Bruce Winders, Mr. Polk’s Army: The American Military Experience in the Mexican War (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 1997), chap. 6, esp. 92–97.

  2. Daniel Harvey Hill, A Fighter from Way Back: The Mexican War Diary of Lt. Daniel Harvey Hill, 4th Artillery, USA, ed. Nathaniel Cheairs Hughes Jr. and Timothy D. Johnson (Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 2002), 73; H. Judge Moore, Scott’s Campaign from the Rendezvous on the Island of Lobos to the Taking of the City (Charleston: J. B. Nixon, 1849), 6; George B. McClellan, The Mexican War Diary of General George B. McClellan Diary, ed. William Stan Myers (New York: DaCapo Press, 1972), 53–54; K. Jack Bauer, The Mexican War, 1846–1848 (1974; Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1992), 244; Amasa Gleason Clark, Reminiscences of a Centenarian (Bandera, Tex.: Amasa Gleason Clark, 1930), 14; K. Jack Bauer, Surf boats and Horse Marines: U.S. Naval Operations in the Mexican War, 1846–48 (Annapolis: United States Naval Institute, 1969), 78–79. An eyewitness account puts the time of the signal shot at 4:00 P.M., while K. Jack Bauer places the time at 5:30. There seems to be general agreement, however, that the Americans hit the beach at about 5:30. Assuming that to be accurate, and assuming that it could not have taken more than ten to fifteen minutes to row to shore, it seems logical to conclude that the signal gun was fired sometime between 5:00 and 5:30. See Unknown, “Campaigns in Mexico,” BLY; Clark, Reminiscences, 12; George Turnbull Moore Davis, Autobiography of the Late Col. Geo T. M. Davis, Captain and Aid-de-Camp Scott’s Army of Invasion (New York: Jenkins and McCowan, 1891), 124. In the nineteenth century, the “Star Spangled Banner,” written by Francis Scott Key after watching the shelling of Fort McHenry, was set to the music of an old English drinking song entitled “To Anacreontic in Heaven.”

  3. Winfield Scott, Memoirs of Lieut.-General Scott, 2 vols. (1864; Freeport, N.Y.: Books for Libraries Press, 1970), 2:404.

  4. Justin H. Smith, The War with Mexico, 2 vols. (New York: Macmillan, 1919), 1:536, n. 2; William A. DePalo Jr., The Mexican National Army, 1822–1852 (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 1997), 118; Meade to wife, Jul. 9, 1846, in George Meade, The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade, 2 vols. (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1913), 1:188; Samuel Chase to Conner, Dec. 20, 1846, David Conner Papers, LC; Thomas D. Tennery, The Mexican War Diary of Thomas D. Tennery, ed. D. E. Livingston-Little (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1970), 76; Samuel Lauderdale to James Lauderdale, Apr. 2, 1847, Lauderdale Family Papers, TSLA; T. H. Towner to Benjamin Towner, Feb. 12, 1847, Benjamin T. Towner Papers, Duke University, Durham, N.C.

  5. Bauer, Mexican War, 70–71; Smith, War, 1:198; David M. Pletcher, The Diplomacy of Annexation: Texas, Oregon, and the Mexican War (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1973), 398–99, 455; Ivor Debenham Spencer, The Victor and the Spoils: A Life of William L. Marcy (Providence: Brown University Press, 1959), 155; James K. Polk, The Diary of James K. Polk, ed. Milo Milton Quaife, 4 vols. (Chicago: A. C. McClurg, 1910) 1:408; Eugene Irving McCormac, James K. Polk: A Political Biography (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1922), 419; Scott to Marcy, May 21, 1846, Senate Docs., No. 378, 29th Cong., 1st Sess. For an excellent overview of the events leading to the war, see Richard Bruce Winders, Crisis in the Southwest: The United States, Mexico, and the Struggle over Texas (Wilmington, Del.: Scholarly Resources, 2002).

  6. Polk, Diary, 1:415, 419–22, 428; Marcy to Scott, May 25, 1846, and Marcy to Wetmore, Jun. 13 and Jun. 28, 1846, William L. Marcy Papers, LC, Washington D.C.; Scott to Marcy, May 25, 1846, Senate Doc., No. 378, 29th Cong., 1st Exec. Scott to Thomas Ritchie and John Heiss, Jun. 10, 1846, Charles Winslow Elliott Collection, New York Public Library; Scott to Duncan Clinch, Jul. 10, 1846, Robert Anderson Papers, LC; Scott, Memoirs, 2:385. Marcy’s biographer speculated that the secretary disagreed with Polk’s decision to remove Scott from field command but dutifully went along with the president’s decision. See Spencer, The Victor and the Spoils, 155. Historian Sam W. Haynes has described Polk as a “dogmatic” man who had a “penchant for disingenuousness, if not outright deception.” See his study, James K. Polk and the Expansionist Impulse (New York: Longman, 1997), 43, 94–95; 71–72, 155.

  7. Others would claim credit for the idea to capture Veracruz and use it as a base of operations against Mexico City. However, Scott is known to have discussed the idea with Marcy as early as Jul. 9. In his memoirs, Scott asserted that the idea to launch at attack beginning at Veracruz was “an idea always mine.” See Scott, Memoirs, 2:404. In September, Polk had ordered the capture of the coastal town of Tampico 250 miles south of the Rio Grande, but its distance from Mexico City and its lack of good roads made it an unfavorable invasion point. See Bauer, Mexican War, 233.

  8. Winfield Scott, “Vera Cruz & Its Castle,” Oct. 27, 1846, LR, RG 107, NA; Scott to War Department, Oct. 27, 1846, House Exec. Doc. No. 60, 30th Cong., 1st Exec.; Irving W. Levinson, Wars within War: Mexican Guerrillas, Domestic Elites, and the United States of America, 1846–1848 (Forth Worth: Texas Christian University Press, 2005), 18–19. The three states occupied by Taylor’s army had 276,512 inhabitants, or less than 4 percent of Mexico’s total population.

  9. Spencer, The Victor and the Spoils, 156, 160–61; Polk, Diary, 2:227, 243–45, 247, 275–77, 282, 301–2, 399; Bauer, Mexican War, 235. Many Whigs saw the conflict as a war of aggression and condemned it. They condemned Polk for his treatment of Scott. See Michael F. Holt, The Rise and Fall of the American Whig Party: Jacksonian Politics and the Onset of the Civil War (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 249.

  10. Paul Foos, A Short, Offhand, Killing Affair: Soldiers and Social Conflict during the Mexican-American War (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2002), 98; Thomas Williams to father, Jan. 12, 1847, Williams Letters, Justin H. Smith Collection, LAC, UT; Scott, Memoirs, 2:392–94; Allan Peskin, ed., Volunteers: The Mexican War Journals of Private Richard Coulter and Sergeant Thomas Barclay, Company E, Second Pennsylvania Infantry (Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1991), 127; Haynes, Polk and the Expansionist Impulse, 152; Hill, Fighter from Way Back, 28, 47; John Lillard to father, Feb. 10, 1847, Lillard Family Papers, FHS; Henry O. Whiteside, “Winfield Scott and the Mexican Occupation: Policy and Practice,” Mid-America 52 (1970): 103, 105–6.

  11. Whiteside, “Winfield Scott,” 105–6; “The Special Message,” Jan. 2, 1847, John W. James Collection of Mexican War Articles, BLY. For an overview of the lessons that Scott learned from the Napoleonic Wars, see Timothy D. Johnson, Winfield Scott: The Quest for Military Glory (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1998), 166–69.

  12. Scott to Taylor, Nov. 25, 1846, and Scott to Marcy, Dec. 27, 1846, Marcy Papers, LC; Scott to Taylor, Dec. 20, 1846, House Executive Doc. No. 56, 30th Cong., 1st Exec.; Bauer, Mexican War, 238; Holman Hamilton, Zachary Taylor: Soldier of the Republic (Hamden, Conn.: Archon Books, 1966), 115, 228–29; Henry S. Lane, “The Mexican War Journal of Henry S. Lane,” ed. Graham A. Barringer, Indiana Magazine of History 53 (Dec. 1957): 418; Scott to Marcy, Jan. 24, 1847, LR, AGO, RG 94, NA; K. Jack Bauer, Zachary Taylor: Soldier, Planter, Statesman of the Old Southwest (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1985), 192–93; Dabney Herdon Maury, Recollections of a Virginian in the Mexican, Indian, and Civil Wars (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1894), 29.

  13. Scott to Marcy, Jan. 16 and Jan. 27, 1847, Marcy Papers.

  14. George Rollie Adams, General William S. Harney: Prince of Dragoons (Lincoln: University of Nebraska P
ress, 2001), 80–85, 88, 91–92; General Orders No. 5, Jan. 28, and General Orders No. 11, Feb. 2, 1847, Justin H. Smith Collection, LAC, UT; Polk, Diary, 2:385.

  15. George C. Furber, The Twelve Months Volunteers; or, Journal of a Private, in the Tennessee Regiment of Cavalry, in the Campaign Mexico, 1846–7 (Cincinnati: J. A. & U. P. James, 1848), 403–4; Paul D. Casdorph, Prince John Magruder: His Life and Campaigns (New York: John Wiley, 1996), 64; Meade to wife, Jan. 24 and Feb. 26, 1847, Meade, Life and Letters, 1:175, 185.

  16. General Orders No. 21, Feb. 19, 1847, Smith Collection.

  17. Moore, Scott’s Campaign, 1–2; Sargent, Gathering Laurels, 4; John Hammond Moore, ed., “Private Johnson Fights the Mexicans, 1847–1848,” South Carolina Historical Magazine 67 (Oct. 1966): 204; Kirby Smith to wife, Feb. 28, 1847, in E. Kirby Smith, To Mexico with Scott: Letters of Captain E. Kirby Smith to His Wife, ed. Emma Jerome Blackwood (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1917), 105; Scott to Conner, Feb. 26, 1847, and William Hunt to Conner, Mar. 4, 1847, David Conner Papers, LC; Alfred Hoyt Bill, Rehearsal for Conflict: The War with Mexico, 1846–1848 (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1947), 206; Bauer, Mexican War, 240; Smith, War, 1:368, 2:18.

  18. Bauer, Surf boats, 80–82; Unknown, “Campaigns in Mexico,” BLY; Raphael Semmes, Service Afloat and Ashore during the Mexican War (Cincinnati: Wm. H. Moore, 1851), 128; quote from Lee to Mary Lee, Mar. 13, 1847, George Bolling Lee Papers; Kendall to Picayune, Mar. 12, 1847, Kendall Family Papers, UTA; Clark, Reminiscences, 15.