Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, Complete

We had not occupied this position long when it was discovered that our ammunition was growing low.I volunteered to go back to the point we had started from, report our position to General Twiggs, and ask for ammunition to be forwarded.

[General Garland expressed a wish to get a message back to General Twiggs, his division commander, or General Taylor, to the effect that he was nearly out of ammunition and must have more sent to him, or otherwise be reinforced. Deeming the return dangerous he did not like to order any one to carry it, so he called for a volunteer. Lieutenant Grant offered his services, which were accepted. —PUBLISHERS.]

We were at this time occupying ground off from the street, in rear of the houses.My ride back was an exposed one.Before starting I adjusted myself on the side of my horse furthest from the enemy, and with only one foot holding to the cantle of the saddle, and an arm over the neck of the horse exposed, I started at full run.It was only at street crossings that my horse was under fire, but these I crossed at such a flying rate that generally I was past and under cover of the next block of houses before the enemy fired.I got out safely without a scratch.

At one place on my ride, I saw a sentry walking in front of a house, and stopped to inquire what he was doing there.Finding that the house was full of wounded American officers and soldiers, I dismounted and went in.I found there Captain Williams, of the Engineer Corps, wounded in the head, probably fatally, and Lieutenant Territt, also badly wounded his bowels protruding from his wound.There were quite a number of soldiers also.Promising them to report their situation, I left, readjusted myself to my horse, recommenced the run, and was soon with the troops at the east end.Before ammunition could be collected, the two regiments I had been with were seen returning, running the same gauntlet in getting out that they had passed in going in, but with comparatively little loss.The movement was countermanded and the troops were withdrawn.The poor wounded officers and men I had found, fell into the hands of the enemy during the night, and died.

While this was going on at the east, General Worth, with a small division of troops, was advancing towards the plaza from the opposite end of the city.He resorted to a better expedient for getting to the plaza—the citadel—than we did on the east.Instead of moving by the open streets, he advanced through the houses, cutting passageways from one to another.Without much loss of life, he got so near the plaza during the night that before morning, Ampudia, the Mexican commander, made overtures for the surrender of the city and garrison.This stopped all further hostilities.The terms of surrender were soon agreed upon.The prisoners were paroled and permitted to take their horses and personal property with them.

My pity was aroused by the sight of the Mexican garrison of Monterey marching out of town as prisoners, and no doubt the same feeling was experienced by most of our army who witnessed it.Many of the prisoners were cavalry, armed with lances, and mounted on miserable little half-starved horses that did not look as if they could carry their riders out of town.The men looked in but little better condition.I thought how little interest the men before me had in the results of the war, and how little knowledge they had of "what it was all about."

After the surrender of the garrison of Monterey a quiet camp life was led until midwinter.As had been the case on the Rio Grande, the people who remained at their homes fraternized with the "Yankees" in the pleasantest manner.In fact, under the humane policy of our commander, I question whether the great majority of the Mexican people did not regret our departure as much as they had regretted our coming.Property and person were thoroughly protected, and a market was afforded for all the products of the country such as the people had never enjoyed before.The educated and wealthy portion of the population here, as elsewhere, abandoned their homes and remained away from them as long as they were in the possession of the invaders; but this class formed a very small percentage of the whole population.

CHAPTER IX.

POLITICAL INTRIGUE—BUENA VISTA—MOVEMENT AGAINST VERA CRUZ—SIEGE AND CAPTURE OF VERA CRUZ.

The Mexican war was a political war, and the administration conducting it desired to make party capital out of it.General Scott was at the head of the army, and, being a soldier of acknowledged professional capacity, his claim to the command of the forces in the field was almost indisputable and does not seem to have been denied by President Polk, or Marcy, his Secretary of War.Scott was a Whig and the administration was democratic.General Scott was also known to have political aspirations, and nothing so popularizes a candidate for high civil positions as military victories.It would not do therefore to give him command of the "army of conquest."The plans submitted by Scott for a campaign in Mexico were disapproved by the administration, and he replied, in a tone possibly a little disrespectful, to the effect that, if a soldier's plans were not to be supported by the administration, success could not be expected.This was on the 27th of May, 1846.Four days later General Scott was notified that he need not go to Mexico.General Gaines was next in rank, but he was too old and feeble to take the field.Colonel Zachary Taylor—a brigadier-general by brevet—was therefore left in command.He, too, was a Whig, but was not supposed to entertain any political ambitions; nor did he; but after the fall of Monterey, his third battle and third complete victory, the Whig papers at home began to speak of him as the candidate of their party for the Presidency.Something had to be done to neutralize his growing popularity.He could not be relieved from duty in the field where all his battles had been victories: the design would have been too transparent.It was finally decided to send General Scott to Mexico in chief command, and to authorize him to carry out his own original plan: that is, capture Vera Cruz and march upon the capital of the country.It was no doubt supposed that Scott's ambition would lead him to slaughter Taylor or destroy his chances for the Presidency, and yet it was hoped that he would not make sufficient capital himself to secure the prize.

The administration had indeed a most embarrassing problem to solve.It was engaged in a war of conquest which must be carried to a successful issue, or the political object would be unattained.Yet all the capable officers of the requisite rank belonged to the opposition, and the man selected for his lack of political ambition had himself become a prominent candidate for the Presidency.It was necessary to destroy his chances promptly.The problem was to do this without the loss of conquest and without permitting another general of the same political party to acquire like popularity.The fact is, the administration of Mr. Polk made every preparation to disgrace Scott, or, to speak more correctly, to drive him to such desperation that he would disgrace himself.

General Scott had opposed conquest by the way of the Rio Grande, Matamoras and Saltillo from the first.Now that he was in command of all the forces in Mexico, he withdrew from Taylor most of his regular troops and left him only enough volunteers, as he thought, to hold the line then in possession of the invading army.Indeed Scott did not deem it important to hold anything beyond the Rio Grande, and authorized Taylor to fall back to that line if he chose.General Taylor protested against the depletion of his army, and his subsequent movement upon Buena Vista would indicate that he did not share the views of his chief in regard to the unimportance of conquest beyond the Rio Grande.

Scott had estimated the men and material that would be required to capture Vera Cruz and to march on the capital of the country, two hundred and sixty miles in the interior.He was promised all he asked and seemed to have not only the confidence of the President, but his sincere good wishes.The promises were all broken.Only about half the troops were furnished that had been pledged, other war material was withheld and Scott had scarcely started for Mexico before the President undertook to supersede him by the appointment of Senator Thomas H.Benton as lieutenant-general.This being refused by Congress, the President asked legislative authority to place a junior over a senior of the same grade, with the view of appointing Benton to the rank of major-general and then placing him in command of the army, but Congress failed to accede to this proposition as well, and Scott remained in command: but every general appointed to serve under him was politically opposed to the chief, and several were personally hostile.

General Scott reached Brazos Santiago or Point Isabel, at the mouth of the Rio Grande, late in December, 1846, and proceeded at once up the river to Camargo, where he had written General Taylor to meet him.Taylor, however, had gone to, or towards Tampico, for the purpose of establishing a post there.He had started on this march before he was aware of General Scott being in the country.Under these circumstances Scott had to issue his orders designating the troops to be withdrawn from Taylor, without the personal consultation he had expected to hold with his subordinate.

General Taylor's victory at Buena Vista, February 22d, 23d, and 24th, 1847, with an army composed almost entirely of volunteers who had not been in battle before, and over a vastly superior force numerically, made his nomination for the Presidency by the Whigs a foregone conclusion.He was nominated and elected in 1848.I believe that he sincerely regretted this turn in his fortunes, preferring the peace afforded by a quiet life free from abuse to the honor of filling the highest office in the gift of any people, the Presidency of the United States.

When General Scott assumed command of the army of invasion, I was in the division of General David Twiggs, in Taylor's command; but under the new orders my regiment was transferred to the division of General William Worth, in which I served to the close of the war.The troops withdrawn from Taylor to form part of the forces to operate against Vera Cruz, were assembled at the mouth of the Rio Grande preparatory to embarkation for their destination.I found General Worth a different man from any I had before served directly under.He was nervous, impatient and restless on the march, or when important or responsible duty confronted him.There was not the least reason for haste on the march, for it was known that it would take weeks to assemble shipping enough at the point of our embarkation to carry the army, but General Worth moved his division with a rapidity that would have been commendable had he been going to the relief of a beleaguered garrison.The length of the marches was regulated by the distances between places affording a supply of water for the troops, and these distances were sometimes long and sometimes short.General Worth on one occasion at least, after having made the full distance intended for the day, and after the troops were in camp and preparing their food, ordered tents struck and made the march that night which had been intended for the next day.Some commanders can move troops so as to get the maximum distance out of them without fatigue, while others can wear them out in a few days without accomplishing so much.General Worth belonged to this latter class.He enjoyed, however, a fine reputation for his fighting qualities, and thus attached his officers and men to him.

The army lay in camp upon the sand-beach in the neighborhood of the mouth of the Rio Grande for several weeks, awaiting the arrival of transports to carry it to its new field of operations.The transports were all sailing vessels.The passage was a tedious one, and many of the troops were on shipboard over thirty days from the embarkation at the mouth of the Rio Grande to the time of debarkation south of Vera Cruz.The trip was a comfortless one for officers and men.The transports used were built for carrying freight and possessed but limited accommodations for passengers, and the climate added to the discomfort of all.

The transports with troops were assembled in the harbor of Anton Lizardo, some sixteen miles south of Vera Cruz, as they arrived, and there awaited the remainder of the fleet, bringing artillery, ammunition and supplies of all kinds from the North.With the fleet there was a little steam propeller dispatch-boat—the first vessel of the kind I had ever seen, and probably the first of its kind ever seen by any one then with the army.At that day ocean steamers were rare, and what there were were sidewheelers.This little vessel, going through the fleet so fast, so noiselessly and with its propeller under water out of view, attracted a great deal of attention.I recollect that Lieutenant Sidney Smith, of the 4th infantry, by whom I happened to be standing on the deck of a vessel when this propeller was passing, exclaimed, "Why, the thing looks as if it was propelled by the force of circumstances."

Finally on the 7th of March, 1847, the little army of ten or twelve thousand men, given Scott to invade a country with a population of seven or eight millions, a mountainous country affording the greatest possible natural advantages for defence, was all assembled and ready to commence the perilous task of landing from vessels lying in the open sea.

The debarkation took place inside of the little island of Sacrificios, some three miles south of Vera Cruz.The vessels could not get anywhere near shore, so that everything had to be landed in lighters or surf-boats; General Scott had provided these before leaving the North.The breakers were sometimes high, so that the landing was tedious.The men were got ashore rapidly, because they could wade when they came to shallow water; but the camp and garrison equipage, provisions, ammunition and all stores had to be protected from the salt water, and therefore their landing took several days.The Mexicans were very kind to us, however, and threw no obstacles in the way of our landing except an occasional shot from their nearest fort.During the debarkation one shot took off the head of Major Albertis.No other, I believe, reached anywhere near the same distance.On the 9th of March the troops were landed and the investment of Vera Cruz, from the Gulf of Mexico south of the city to the Gulf again on the north, was soon and easily effected.The landing of stores was continued until everything was got ashore.

Vera Cruz, at the time of which I write and up to 1880, was a walled city.The wall extended from the water's edge south of the town to the water again on the north.There were fortifications at intervals along the line and at the angles.In front of the city, and on an island half a mile out in the Gulf, stands San Juan de Ulloa, an enclosed fortification of large dimensions and great strength for that period.Against artillery of the present day the land forts and walls would prove elements of weakness rather than strength.After the invading army had established their camps out of range of the fire from the city, batteries were established, under cover of night, far to the front of the line where the troops lay.These batteries were intrenched and the approaches sufficiently protected.If a sortie had been made at any time by the Mexicans, the men serving the batteries could have been quickly reinforced without great exposure to the fire from the enemy's main line.No serious attempt was made to capture the batteries or to drive our troops away.

The siege continued with brisk firing on our side till the 27th of March, by which time a considerable breach had been made in the wall surrounding the city.Upon this General Morales, who was Governor of both the city and of San Juan de Ulloa, commenced a correspondence with General Scott looking to the surrender of the town, forts and garrison.On the 29th Vera Cruz and San Juan de Ulloa were occupied by Scott's army.About five thousand prisoners and four hundred pieces of artillery, besides large amounts of small arms and ammunition, fell into the hands of the victorious force.The casualties on our side during the siege amounted to sixty-four officers and men, killed and wounded.

CHAPTER X.

MARCH TO JALAPA—BATTLE OF CERRO GORDO—PEROTE—PUEBLA—SCOTT AND TAYLOR.

General Scott had less than twelve thousand men at Vera Cruz.He had been promised by the administration a very much larger force, or claimed that he had, and he was a man of veracity.Twelve thousand was a very small army with which to penetrate two hundred and sixty miles into an enemy's country, and to besiege the capital; a city, at that time, of largely over one hundred thousand inhabitants.Then, too, any line of march that could be selected led through mountain passes easily defended.In fact, there were at that time but two roads from Vera Cruz to the City of Mexico that could be taken by an army; one by Jalapa and Perote, the other by Cordova and Orizaba, the two coming together on the great plain which extends to the City of Mexico after the range of mountains is passed.

It was very important to get the army away from Vera Cruz as soon as possible, in order to avoid the yellow fever, or vomito, which usually visits that city early in the year, and is very fatal to persons not acclimated; but transportation, which was expected from the North, was arriving very slowly.It was absolutely necessary to have enough to supply the army to Jalapa, sixty-five miles in the interior and above the fevers of the coast.At that point the country is fertile, and an army of the size of General Scott's could subsist there for an indefinite period.Not counting the sick, the weak and the garrisons for the captured city and fort, the moving column was now less than ten thousand strong.This force was composed of three divisions, under Generals Twiggs, Patterson, and Worth.The importance of escaping the vomito was so great that as soon as transportation enough could be got together to move a division the advance was commenced.On the 8th of April, Twiggs's division started for Jalapa.He was followed very soon by Patterson, with his division.General Worth was to bring up the rear with his command as soon as transportation enough was assembled to carry six days' rations for his troops with the necessary ammunition and camp and garrison equipage.It was the 13th of April before this division left Vera Cruz.

The leading division ran against the enemy at Cerro Gordo, some fifty miles west, on the road to Jalapa, and went into camp at Plan del Rio, about three miles from the fortifications.General Patterson reached Plan del Rio with his division soon after Twiggs arrived.The two were then secure against an attack from Santa Anna, who commanded the Mexican forces.At all events they confronted the enemy without reinforcements and without molestation, until the 18th of April.General Scott had remained at Vera Cruz to hasten preparations for the field; but on the 12th, learning the situation at the front, he hastened on to take personal supervision.He at once commenced his preparations for the capture of the position held by Santa Anna and of the troops holding it.

Cerro Gordo is one of the higher spurs of the mountains some twelve to fifteen miles east of Jalapa, and Santa Anna had selected this point as the easiest to defend against an invading army.The road, said to have been built by Cortez, zigzags around the mountain-side and was defended at every turn by artillery.On either side were deep chasms or mountain walls.A direct attack along the road was an impossibility.A flank movement seemed equally impossible.After the arrival of the commanding-general upon the scene, reconnoissances were sent out to find, or to make, a road by which the rear of the enemy's works might be reached without a front attack.These reconnoissances were made under the supervision of Captain Robert E.Lee, assisted by Lieutenants P.G.T.Beauregard, Isaac I.Stevens, Z.B.Tower, G.W.Smith, George B.McClellan, and J.G.Foster, of the corps of engineers, all officers who attained rank and fame, on one side or the other, in the great conflict for the preservation of the unity of the nation.The reconnoissance was completed, and the labor of cutting out and making roads by the flank of the enemy was effected by the 17th of the month.This was accomplished without the knowledge of Santa Anna or his army, and over ground where he supposed it impossible.On the same day General Scott issued his order for the attack on the 18th.

The attack was made as ordered, and perhaps there was not a battle of the Mexican war, or of any other, where orders issued before an engagement were nearer being a correct report of what afterwards took place.Under the supervision of the engineers, roadways had been opened over chasms to the right where the walls were so steep that men could barely climb them.Animals could not.These had been opened under cover of night, without attracting the notice of the enemy.The engineers, who had directed the opening, led the way and the troops followed.Artillery was let down the steep slopes by hand, the men engaged attaching a strong rope to the rear axle and letting the guns down, a piece at a time, while the men at the ropes kept their ground on top, paying out gradually, while a few at the front directed the course of the piece.In like manner the guns were drawn by hand up the opposite slopes.In this way Scott's troops reached their assigned position in rear of most of the intrenchments of the enemy, unobserved.The attack was made, the Mexican reserves behind the works beat a hasty retreat, and those occupying them surrendered.On the left General Pillow's command made a formidable demonstration, which doubtless held a part of the enemy in his front and contributed to the victory.I am not pretending to give full details of all the battles fought, but of the portion that I saw.There were troops engaged on both sides at other points in which both sustained losses; but the battle was won as here narrated.

The surprise of the enemy was complete, the victory overwhelming; some three thousand prisoners fell into Scott's hands, also a large amount of ordnance and ordnance stores.The prisoners were paroled, the artillery parked and the small arms and ammunition destroyed.The battle of Buena Vista was probably very important to the success of General Scott at Cerro Gordo and in his entire campaign from Vera Cruz to the great plains reaching to the City of Mexico.The only army Santa Anna had to protect his capital and the mountain passes west of Vera Cruz, was the one he had with him confronting General Taylor.It is not likely that he would have gone as far north as Monterey to attack the United States troops when he knew his country was threatened with invasion further south.When Taylor moved to Saltillo and then advanced on to Buena Vista, Santa Anna crossed the desert confronting the invading army, hoping no doubt to crush it and get back in time to meet General Scott in the mountain passes west of Vera Cruz.His attack on Taylor was disastrous to the Mexican army, but, notwithstanding this, he marched his army to Cerro Gordo, a distance not much short of one thousand miles by the line he had to travel, in time to intrench himself well before Scott got there.If he had been successful at Buena Vista his troops would no doubt have made a more stubborn resistance at Cerro Gordo.Had the battle of Buena Vista not been fought Santa Anna would have had time to move leisurely to meet the invader further south and with an army not demoralized nor depleted by defeat.

After the battle the victorious army moved on to Jalapa, where it was in a beautiful, productive and healthy country, far above the fevers of the coast.Jalapa, however, is still in the mountains, and between there and the great plain the whole line of the road is easy of defence.It was important, therefore, to get possession of the great highway between the sea-coast and the capital up to the point where it leaves the mountains, before the enemy could have time to re-organize and fortify in our front.Worth's division was selected to go forward to secure this result.The division marched to Perote on the great plain, not far from where the road debouches from the mountains.There is a low, strong fort on the plain in front of the town, known as the Castle of Perote.This, however, offered no resistance and fell into our hands, with its armament.

General Scott having now only nine or ten thousand men west of Vera Cruz, and the time of some four thousand of them being about to expire, a long delay was the consequence.The troops were in a healthy climate, and where they could subsist for an indefinite period even if their line back to Vera Cruz should be cut off.It being ascertained that the men whose time would expire before the City of Mexico could possibly fall into the hands of the American army, would not remain beyond the term for which they had volunteered, the commanding-general determined to discharge them at once, for a delay until the expiration of their time would have compelled them to pass through Vera Cruz during the season of the vomito.This reduced Scott's force in the field to about five thousand men.

Early in May, Worth, with his division, left Perote and marched on to Puebla.The roads were wide and the country open except through one pass in a spur of mountains coming up from the south, through which the road runs.Notwithstanding this the small column was divided into two bodies, moving a day apart.Nothing occurred on the march of special note, except that while lying at the town of Amozoque—an easy day's march east of Puebla—a body of the enemy's cavalry, two or three thousand strong, was seen to our right, not more than a mile away.A battery or two, with two or three infantry regiments, was sent against them and they soon disappeared.On the 15th of May we entered the city of Puebla.

General Worth was in command at Puebla until the latter end of May, when General Scott arrived.Here, as well as on the march up, his restlessness, particularly under responsibilities, showed itself.During his brief command he had the enemy hovering around near the city, in vastly superior numbers to his own.The brigade to which I was attached changed quarters three different times in about a week, occupying at first quarters near the plaza, in the heart of the city; then at the western entrance; then at the extreme east.On one occasion General Worth had the troops in line, under arms, all day, with three days' cooked rations in their haversacks.He galloped from one command to another proclaiming the near proximity of Santa Anna with an army vastly superior to his own.General Scott arrived upon the scene the latter part of the month, and nothing more was heard of Santa Anna and his myriads.There were, of course, bodies of mounted Mexicans hovering around to watch our movements and to pick up stragglers, or small bodies of troops, if they ventured too far out.These always withdrew on the approach of any considerable number of our soldiers.After the arrival of General Scott I was sent, as quartermaster, with a large train of wagons, back two days' march at least, to procure forage.We had less than a thousand men as escort, and never thought of danger.We procured full loads for our entire train at two plantations, which could easily have furnished as much more.

There had been great delay in obtaining the authority of Congress for the raising of the troops asked for by the administration.A bill was before the National Legislature from early in the session of 1846-7, authorizing the creation of ten additional regiments for the war to be attached to the regular army, but it was the middle of February before it became a law.Appointments of commissioned officers had then to be made; men had to be enlisted, the regiments equipped and the whole transported to Mexico.It was August before General Scott received reinforcement sufficient to warrant an advance.His moving column, not even now more than ten thousand strong, was in four divisions, commanded by Generals Twiggs, Worth, Pillow and Quitman.There was also a cavalry corps under General Harney, composed of detachments of the 1st, 2d, and 3d dragoons.The advance commenced on the 7th of August with Twiggs's division in front.The remaining three divisions followed, with an interval of a day between.The marches were short, to make concentration easier in case of attack.

I had now been in battle with the two leading commanders conducting armies in a foreign land.The contrast between the two was very marked.General Taylor never wore uniform, but dressed himself entirely for comfort.He moved about the field in which he was operating to see through his own eyes the situation.Often he would be without staff officers, and when he was accompanied by them there was no prescribed order in which they followed.He was very much given to sit his horse side-ways—with both feet on one side—particularly on the battlefield.General Scott was the reverse in all these particulars.He always wore all the uniform prescribed or allowed by law when he inspected his lines; word would be sent to all division and brigade commanders in advance, notifying them of the hour when the commanding general might be expected.This was done so that all the army might be under arms to salute their chief as he passed.On these occasions he wore his dress uniform, cocked hat, aiguillettes, sabre and spurs.His staff proper, besides all officers constructively on his staff—engineers, inspectors, quartermasters, etc., that could be spared—followed, also in uniform and in prescribed order.Orders were prepared with great care and evidently with the view that they should be a history of what followed.

In their modes of expressing thought, these two generals contrasted quite as strongly as in their other characteristics.General Scott was precise in language, cultivated a style peculiarly his own; was proud of his rhetoric; not averse to speaking of himself, often in the third person, and he could bestow praise upon the person he was talking about without the least embarrassment.Taylor was not a conversationalist, but on paper he could put his meaning so plainly that there could be no mistaking it.He knew how to express what he wanted to say in the fewest well-chosen words, but would not sacrifice meaning to the construction of high-sounding sentences.But with their opposite characteristics both were great and successful soldiers; both were true, patriotic and upright in all their dealings.Both were pleasant to serve under—Taylor was pleasant to serve with.Scott saw more through the eyes of his staff officers than through his own.His plans were deliberately prepared, and fully expressed in orders.Taylor saw for himself, and gave orders to meet the emergency without reference to how they would read in history.

CHAPTER XI.

ADVANCE ON THE CITY OF MEXICO—BATTLE OF CONTRERAS—ASSAULT AT CHURUBUSCO—NEGOTIATIONS FOR PEACE—BATTLE OF MOLINO DEL REY—STORMING OF CHAPULTEPEC—SAN COSME—EVACUATION OF THE CITY—HALLS OF THE MONTEZUMAS.

The route followed by the army from Puebla to the City of Mexico was over Rio Frio mountain, the road leading over which, at the highest point, is about eleven thousand feet above tide water.The pass through this mountain might have been easily defended, but it was not; and the advanced division reached the summit in three days after leaving Puebla.The City of Mexico lies west of Rio Frio mountain, on a plain backed by another mountain six miles farther west, with others still nearer on the north and south.Between the western base of Rio Frio and the City of Mexico there are three lakes, Chalco and Xochimilco on the left and Texcoco on the right, extending to the east end of the City of Mexico.Chalco and Texcoco are divided by a narrow strip of land over which the direct road to the city runs.Xochimilco is also to the left of the road, but at a considerable distance south of it, and is connected with Lake Chalco by a narrow channel.There is a high rocky mound, called El Penon, on the right of the road, springing up from the low flat ground dividing the lakes.This mound was strengthened by intrenchments at its base and summit, and rendered a direct attack impracticable.

Scott's army was rapidly concentrated about Ayotla and other points near the eastern end of Lake Chalco.Reconnoissances were made up to within gun-shot of El Penon, while engineers were seeking a route by the south side of Lake Chalco to flank the city, and come upon it from the south and south-west.A way was found around the lake, and by the 18th of August troops were in St.Augustin Tlalpam, a town about eleven miles due south from the plaza of the capital.Between St.Augustin Tlalpam and the city lie the hacienda of San Antonio and the village of Churubusco, and south-west of them is Contreras.All these points, except St.Augustin Tlalpam, were intrenched and strongly garrisoned.Contreras is situated on the side of a mountain, near its base, where volcanic rocks are piled in great confusion, reaching nearly to San Antonio.This made the approach to the city from the south very difficult.

The brigade to which I was attached—Garland's, of Worth's division—was sent to confront San Antonio, two or three miles from St.Augustin Tlalpam, on the road to Churubusco and the City of Mexico.The ground on which San Antonio stands is completely in the valley, and the surface of the land is only a little above the level of the lakes, and, except to the south-west, it was cut up by deep ditches filled with water.To the south-west is the Pedregal—the volcanic rock before spoken of—over which cavalry or artillery could not be passed, and infantry would make but poor progress if confronted by an enemy.From the position occupied by Garland's brigade, therefore, no movement could be made against the defences of San Antonio except to the front, and by a narrow causeway, over perfectly level ground, every inch of which was commanded by the enemy's artillery and infantry.If Contreras, some three miles west and south, should fall into our hands, troops from there could move to the right flank of all the positions held by the enemy between us and the city.Under these circumstances General Scott directed the holding of the front of the enemy without making an attack until further orders.

On the 18th of August, the day of reaching San Augustin Tlalpam, Garland's brigade secured a position within easy range of the advanced intrenchments of San Antonio, but where his troops were protected by an artificial embankment that had been thrown up for some other purpose than defense.General Scott at once set his engineers reconnoitring the works about Contreras, and on the 19th movements were commenced to get troops into positions from which an assault could be made upon the force occupying that place.The Pedregal on the north and north-east, and the mountain on the south, made the passage by either flank of the enemy's defences difficult, for their work stood exactly between those natural bulwarks; but a road was completed during the day and night of the 19th, and troops were got to the north and west of the enemy.

This affair, like that of Cerro Gordo, was an engagement in which the officers of the engineer corps won special distinction.In fact, in both cases, tasks which seemed difficult at first sight were made easier for the troops that had to execute them than they would have been on an ordinary field.The very strength of each of these positions was, by the skill of the engineers, converted into a defence for the assaulting parties while securing their positions for final attack.All the troops with General Scott in the valley of Mexico, except a part of the division of General Quitman at San Augustin Tlalpam and the brigade of Garland (Worth's division) at San Antonio, were engaged at the battle of Contreras, or were on their way, in obedience to the orders of their chief, to reinforce those who were engaged.The assault was made on the morning of the 20th, and in less than half an hour from the sound of the advance the position was in our hands, with many prisoners and large quantities of ordnance and other stores.The brigade commanded by General Riley was from its position the most conspicuous in the final assault, but all did well, volunteers and regulars.

From the point occupied by Garland's brigade we could see the progress made at Contreras and the movement of troops toward the flank and rear of the enemy opposing us.The Mexicans all the way back to the city could see the same thing, and their conduct showed plainly that they did not enjoy the sight.We moved out at once, and found them gone from our immediate front.Clarke's brigade of Worth's division now moved west over the point of the Pedregal, and after having passed to the north sufficiently to clear San Antonio, turned east and got on the causeway leading to Churubusco and the City of Mexico.When he approached Churubusco his left, under Colonel Hoffman, attacked a tete-de-pont at that place and brought on an engagement.About an hour after, Garland was ordered to advance directly along the causeway, and got up in time to take part in the engagement.San Antonio was found evacuated, the evacuation having probably taken place immediately upon the enemy seeing the stars and stripes waving over Contreras.

The troops that had been engaged at Contreras, and even then on their way to that battle-field, were moved by a causeway west of, and parallel to the one by way of San Antonio and Churubusco.It was expected by the commanding general that these troops would move north sufficiently far to flank the enemy out of his position at Churubusco, before turning east to reach the San Antonio road, but they did not succeed in this, and Churubusco proved to be about the severest battle fought in the valley of Mexico.General Scott coming upon the battle-field about this juncture, ordered two brigades, under Shields, to move north and turn the right of the enemy.This Shields did, but not without hard fighting and heavy loss.The enemy finally gave way, leaving in our hands prisoners, artillery and small arms. The balance of the causeway held by the enemy, up to the very gates of the city, fell in like manner.I recollect at this place that some of the gunners who had stood their ground, were deserters from General Taylor's army on the Rio Grande.

Both the strategy and tactics displayed by General Scott in these various engagements of the 20th of August, 1847, were faultless as I look upon them now, after the lapse of so many years.As before stated, the work of the engineer officers who made the reconnoissances and led the different commands to their destinations, was so perfect that the chief was able to give his orders to his various subordinates with all the precision he could use on an ordinary march.I mean, up to the points from which the attack was to commence.After that point is reached the enemy often induces a change of orders not before contemplated.The enemy outside the city outnumbered our soldiery quite three to one, but they had become so demoralized by the succession of defeats this day, that the City of Mexico could have been entered without much further bloodshed.In fact, Captain Philip Kearney—afterwards a general in the war of the rebellion—rode with a squadron of cavalry to the very gates of the city, and would no doubt have entered with his little force, only at that point he was badly wounded, as were several of his officers.He had not heard the call for a halt.

General Franklin Pierce had joined the army in Mexico, at Puebla, a short time before the advance upon the capital commenced.He had consequently not been in any of the engagements of the war up to the battle of Contreras.By an unfortunate fall of his horse on the afternoon of the 19th he was painfully injured.The next day, when his brigade, with the other troops engaged on the same field, was ordered against the flank and rear of the enemy guarding the different points of the road from San Augustin Tlalpam to the city, General Pierce attempted to accompany them.He was not sufficiently recovered to do so, and fainted.This circumstance gave rise to exceedingly unfair and unjust criticisms of him when he became a candidate for the Presidency.Whatever General Pierce's qualifications may have been for the Presidency, he was a gentleman and a man of courage.I was not a supporter of him politically, but I knew him more intimately than I did any other of the volunteer generals.

General Scott abstained from entering the city at this time, because Mr. Nicholas P.Trist, the commissioner on the part of the United States to negotiate a treaty of peace with Mexico, was with the army, and either he or General Scott thought—probably both of them—that a treaty would be more possible while the Mexican government was in possession of the capital than if it was scattered and the capital in the hands of an invader.Be this as it may, we did not enter at that time.The army took up positions along the slopes of the mountains south of the city, as far west as Tacubaya.Negotiations were at once entered into with Santa Anna, who was then practically THE GOVERNMENT and the immediate commander of all the troops engaged in defence of the country.A truce was signed which denied to either party the right to strengthen its position, or to receive reinforcements during the continuance of the armistices, but authorized General Scott to draw supplies for his army from the city in the meantime.

Negotiations were commenced at once and were kept up vigorously between Mr. Trist and the commissioners appointed on the part of Mexico, until the 2d of September.At that time Mr. Trist handed in his ultimatum.Texas was to be given up absolutely by Mexico, and New Mexico and California ceded to the United States for a stipulated sum to be afterwards determined.I do not suppose Mr. Trist had any discretion whatever in regard to boundaries.The war was one of conquest, in the interest of an institution, and the probabilities are that private instructions were for the acquisition of territory out of which new States might be carved.At all events the Mexicans felt so outraged at the terms proposed that they commenced preparations for defence, without giving notice of the termination of the armistice.The terms of the truce had been violated before, when teams had been sent into the city to bring out supplies for the army.The first train entering the city was very severely threatened by a mob.This, however, was apologized for by the authorities and all responsibility for it denied; and thereafter, to avoid exciting the Mexican people and soldiery, our teams with their escorts were sent in at night, when the troops were in barracks and the citizens in bed.The circumstance was overlooked and negotiations continued.As soon as the news reached General Scott of the second violation of the armistice, about the 4th of September, he wrote a vigorous note to President Santa Anna, calling his attention to it, and, receiving an unsatisfactory reply, declared the armistice at an end.

General Scott, with Worth's division, was now occupying Tacubaya, a village some four miles south-west of the City of Mexico, and extending from the base up the mountain-side for the distance of half a mile.More than a mile west, and also a little above the plain, stands Molino del Rey.The mill is a long stone structure, one story high and several hundred feet in length.At the period of which I speak General Scott supposed a portion of the mill to be used as a foundry for the casting of guns.This, however, proved to be a mistake.It was valuable to the Mexicans because of the quantity of grain it contained.The building is flat roofed, and a line of sand-bags over the outer walls rendered the top quite a formidable defence for infantry.Chapultepec is a mound springing up from the plain to the height of probably three hundred feet, and almost in a direct line between Molino del Rey and the western part of the city.It was fortified both on the top and on the rocky and precipitous sides.

The City of Mexico is supplied with water by two aqueducts, resting on strong stone arches.One of these aqueducts draws its supply of water from a mountain stream coming into it at or near Molino del Rey, and runs north close to the west base of Chapultepec; thence along the centre of a wide road, until it reaches the road running east into the city by the Garita San Cosme; from which point the aqueduct and road both run east to the city.The second aqueduct starts from the east base of Chapultepec, where it is fed by a spring, and runs north-east to the city.This aqueduct, like the other, runs in the middle of a broad road-way, thus leaving a space on each side.The arches supporting the aqueduct afforded protection for advancing troops as well as to those engaged defensively.At points on the San Cosme road parapets were thrown across, with an embrasure for a single piece of artillery in each.At the point where both road and aqueduct turn at right angles from north to east, there was not only one of these parapets supplied by one gun and infantry supports, but the houses to the north of the San Cosme road, facing south and commanding a view of the road back to Chapultepec, were covered with infantry, protected by parapets made of sandbags.The roads leading to garitas (the gates) San Cosme and Belen, by which these aqueducts enter the city, were strongly intrenched.Deep, wide ditches, filled with water, lined the sides of both roads.Such were the defences of the City of Mexico in September, 1847, on the routes over which General Scott entered.

Prior to the Mexican war General Scott had been very partial to General Worth—indeed he continued so up to the close of hostilities—but, for some reason, Worth had become estranged from his chief.Scott evidently took this coldness somewhat to heart.He did not retaliate, however, but on the contrary showed every disposition to appease his subordinate.It was understood at the time that he gave Worth authority to plan and execute the battle of Molino del Rey without dictation or interference from any one, for the very purpose of restoring their former relations.The effort failed, and the two generals remained ever after cold and indifferent towards each other, if not actually hostile.

The battle of Molino del Rey was fought on the 8th of September.The night of the 7th, Worth sent for his brigade and regimental commanders, with their staffs, to come to his quarters to receive instructions for the morrow.These orders contemplated a movement up to within striking distance of the Mills before daylight.The engineers had reconnoitred the ground as well as possible, and had acquired all the information necessary to base proper orders both for approach and attack.

By daylight on the morning of the 8th, the troops to be engaged at Molino were all at the places designated.The ground in front of the Mills, to the south, was commanded by the artillery from the summit of Chapultepec as well as by the lighter batteries at hand; but a charge was made, and soon all was over.Worth's troops entered the Mills by every door, and the enemy beat a hasty retreat back to Chapultepec.Had this victory been followed up promptly, no doubt Americans and Mexicans would have gone over the defences of Chapultepec so near together that the place would have fallen into our hands without further loss.The defenders of the works could not have fired upon us without endangering their own men.This was not done, and five days later more valuable lives were sacrificed to carry works which had been so nearly in our possession on the 8th.I do not criticise the failure to capture Chapultepec at this time.The result that followed the first assault could not possibly have been foreseen, and to profit by the unexpected advantage, the commanding general must have been on the spot and given the necessary instructions at the moment, or the troops must have kept on without orders.It is always, however, in order to follow a retreating foe, unless stopped or otherwise directed.The loss on our side at Molino del Rey was severe for the numbers engaged.It was especially so among commissioned officers.

I was with the earliest of the troops to enter the Mills.In passing through to the north side, looking towards Chapultepec, I happened to notice that there were armed Mexicans still on top of the building, only a few feet from many of our men.Not seeing any stairway or ladder reaching to the top of the building, I took a few soldiers, and had a cart that happened to be standing near brought up, and, placing the shafts against the wall and chocking the wheels so that the cart could not back, used the shafts as a sort of ladder extending to within three or four feet of the top.By this I climbed to the roof of the building, followed by a few men, but found a private soldier had preceded me by some other way.There were still quite a number of Mexicans on the roof, among them a major and five or six officers of lower grades, who had not succeeded in getting away before our troops occupied the building.They still had their arms, while the soldier before mentioned was walking as sentry, guarding the prisoners he had SURROUNDED, all by himself.I halted the sentinel, received the swords from the commissioned officers, and proceeded, with the assistance of the soldiers now with me, to disable the muskets by striking them against the edge of the wall, and throw them to the ground below.

Molino del Rey was now captured, and the troops engaged, with the exception of an appropriate guard over the captured position and property, were marched back to their quarters in Tacubaya.The engagement did not last many minutes, but the killed and wounded were numerous for the number of troops engaged.

During the night of the 11th batteries were established which could play upon the fortifications of Chapultepec.The bombardment commenced early on the morning of the 12th, but there was no further engagement during this day than that of the artillery.General Scott assigned the capture of Chapultepec to General Pillow, but did not leave the details to his judgment.Two assaulting columns, two hundred and fifty men each, composed of volunteers for the occasion, were formed.They were commanded by Captains McKinzie and Casey respectively.The assault was successful, but bloody.

In later years, if not at the time, the battles of Molino del Rey and Chapultepec have seemed to me to have been wholly unnecessary.When the assaults upon the garitas of San Cosme and Belen were determined upon, the road running east to the former gate could have been reached easily, without an engagement, by moving along south of the Mills until west of them sufficiently far to be out of range, thence north to the road above mentioned; or, if desirable to keep the two attacking columns nearer together, the troops could have been turned east so as to come on the aqueduct road out of range of the guns from Chapultepec.In like manner, the troops designated to act against Belen could have kept east of Chapultepec, out of range, and come on to the aqueduct, also out of range of Chapultepec.Molino del Rey and Chapultepec would both have been necessarily evacuated if this course had been pursued, for they would have been turned.

General Quitman, a volunteer from the State of Mississippi, who stood well with the army both as a soldier and as a man, commanded the column acting against Belen.General Worth commanded the column against San Cosme.When Chapultepec fell the advance commenced along the two aqueduct roads.I was on the road to San Cosme, and witnessed most that took place on that route.When opposition was encountered our troops sheltered themselves by keeping under the arches supporting the aqueduct, advancing an arch at a time.We encountered no serious obstruction until within gun-shot of the point where the road we were on intersects that running east to the city, the point where the aqueduct turns at a right angle.I have described the defences of this position before.There were but three commissioned officers besides myself, that I can now call to mind, with the advance when the above position was reached.One of these officers was a Lieutenant Semmes, of the Marine Corps.I think Captain Gore, and Lieutenant Judah, of the 4th infantry, were the others.Our progress was stopped for the time by the single piece of artillery at the angle of the roads and the infantry occupying the house-tops back from it.

West of the road from where we were, stood a house occupying the south-west angle made by the San Cosme road and the road we were moving upon.A stone wall ran from the house along each of these roads for a considerable distance and thence back until it joined, enclosing quite a yard about the house.I watched my opportunity and skipped across the road and behind the south wall.Proceeding cautiously to the west corner of the enclosure, I peeped around and seeing nobody, continued, still cautiously, until the road running east and west was reached.I then returned to the troops, and called for volunteers.All that were close to me, or that heard me, about a dozen, offered their services.Commanding them to carry their arms at a trail, I watched our opportunity and got them across the road and under cover of the wall beyond, before the enemy had a shot at us.Our men under cover of the arches kept a close watch on the intrenchments that crossed our path and the house-tops beyond, and whenever a head showed itself above the parapets they would fire at it.Our crossing was thus made practicable without loss.

When we reached a safe position I instructed my little command again to carry their arms at a trail, not to fire at the enemy until they were ordered, and to move very cautiously following me until the San Cosme road was reached; we would then be on the flank of the men serving the gun on the road, and with no obstruction between us and them.When we reached the south-west corner of the enclosure before described, I saw some United States troops pushing north through a shallow ditch near by, who had come up since my reconnaissance.This was the company of Captain Horace Brooks, of the artillery, acting as infantry.I explained to Brooks briefly what I had discovered and what I was about to do.He said, as I knew the ground and he did not, I might go on and he would follow.As soon as we got on the road leading to the city the troops serving the gun on the parapet retreated, and those on the house-tops near by followed; our men went after them in such close pursuit—the troops we had left under the arches joining—that a second line across the road, about half-way between the first and the garita, was carried.No reinforcements had yet come up except Brooks's company, and the position we had taken was too advanced to be held by so small a force.It was given up, but retaken later in the day, with some loss.

Worth's command gradually advanced to the front now open to it.Later in the day in reconnoitring I found a church off to the south of the road, which looked to me as if the belfry would command the ground back of the garita San Cosme.I got an officer of the voltigeurs, with a mountain howitzer and men to work it, to go with me.The road being in possession of the enemy, we had to take the field to the south to reach the church.This took us over several ditches breast deep in water and grown up with water plants.These ditches, however, were not over eight or ten feet in width.The howitzer was taken to pieces and carried by the men to its destination.When I knocked for admission a priest came to the door who, while extremely polite, declined to admit us.With the little Spanish then at my command, I explained to him that he might save property by opening the door, and he certainly would save himself from becoming a prisoner, for a time at least; and besides, I intended to go in whether he consented or not.He began to see his duty in the same light that I did, and opened the door, though he did not look as if it gave him special pleasure to do so.The gun was carried to the belfry and put together.We were not more than two or three hundred yards from San Cosme.The shots from our little gun dropped in upon the enemy and created great confusion.Why they did not send out a small party and capture us, I do not know.We had no infantry or other defences besides our one gun.

The effect of this gun upon the troops about the gate of the city was so marked that General Worth saw it from his position.

[Mentioned in the reports of Major Lee, Colonel Garland and General Worth.—PUBLISHERS.]

He was so pleased that he sent a staff officer, Lieutenant Pemberton—later Lieutenant-General commanding the defences of Vicksburg—to bring me to him.He expressed his gratification at the services the howitzer in the church steeple was doing, saying that every shot was effective, and ordered a captain of voltigeurs to report to me with another howitzer to be placed along with the one already rendering so much service.I could not tell the General that there was not room enough in the steeple for another gun, because he probably would have looked upon such a statement as a contradiction from a second lieutenant.I took the captain with me, but did not use his gun.

The night of the 13th of September was spent by the troops under General Worth in the houses near San Cosme, and in line confronting the general line of the enemy across to Belen.The troops that I was with were in the houses north of the road leading into the city, and were engaged during the night in cutting passage-ways from one house to another towards the town.During the night Santa Anna, with his army—except the deserters—left the city.He liberated all the convicts confined in the town, hoping, no doubt, that they would inflict upon us some injury before daylight; but several hours after Santa Anna was out of the way, the city authorities sent a delegation to General Scott to ask—if not demand—an armistice, respecting church property, the rights of citizens and the supremacy of the city government in the management of municipal affairs.General Scott declined to trammel himself with conditions, but gave assurances that those who chose to remain within our lines would be protected so long as they behaved themselves properly.

General Quitman had advanced along his line very successfully on the 13th, so that at night his command occupied nearly the same position at Belen that Worth's troops did about San Cosme.After the interview above related between General Scott and the city council, orders were issued for the cautious entry of both columns in the morning.The troops under Worth were to stop at the Alameda, a park near the west end of the city.Quitman was to go directly to the Plaza, and take possession of the Palace—a mass of buildings on the east side in which Congress has its sessions, the national courts are held, the public offices are all located, the President resides, and much room is left for museums, receptions, etc. This is the building generally designated as the "Halls of the Montezumas."

CHAPTER XII.

PROMOTION TO FIRST LIEUTENANT—CAPTURE OF THE CITY OF MEXICO—THE ARMY—MEXICAN SOLDIERS—PEACE NEGOTIATIONS.

On entering the city the troops were fired upon by the released convicts, and possibly by deserters and hostile citizens.The streets were deserted, and the place presented the appearance of a "city of the dead," except for this firing by unseen persons from house-tops, windows, and around corners.In this firing the lieutenant-colonel of my regiment, Garland, was badly wounded, Lieutenant Sidney Smith, of the 4th infantry, was also wounded mortally.He died a few days after, and by his death I was promoted to the grade of first lieutenant.I had gone into the battle of Palo Alto in May, 1846, a second lieutenant, and I entered the city of Mexico sixteen months later with the same rank, after having been in all the engagements possible for any one man and in a regiment that lost more officers during the war than it ever had present at any one engagement.My regiment lost four commissioned officers, all senior to me, by steamboat explosions during the Mexican war.The Mexicans were not so discriminating.They sometimes picked off my juniors.

General Scott soon followed the troops into the city, in state.I wonder that he was not fired upon, but I believe he was not; at all events he was not hurt.He took quarters at first in the "Halls of the Montezumas," and from there issued his wise and discreet orders for the government of a conquered city, and for suppressing the hostile acts of liberated convicts already spoken of—orders which challenge the respect of all who study them.Lawlessness was soon suppressed, and the City of Mexico settled down into a quiet, law-abiding place.The people began to make their appearance upon the streets without fear of the invaders.Shortly afterwards the bulk of the troops were sent from the city to the villages at the foot of the mountains, four or five miles to the south and south-west.

NOTE.—It had been a favorite idea with General Scott for a great many years before the Mexican war to have established in the United States a soldiers' home, patterned after something of the kind abroad, particularly, I believe, in France.He recommended this uniformly, or at least frequently, in his annual reports to the Secretary of War, but never got any hearing.Now, as he had conquered the state, he made assessments upon the different large towns and cities occupied by our troops, in proportion to their capacity to pay, and appointed officers to receive the money.In addition to the sum thus realized he had derived, through capture at Cerro Gordo, sales of captured government tobacco, etc., sums which swelled the fund to a total of about $220,000.Portions of this fund were distributed among the rank and file, given to the wounded in hospital, or applied in other ways, leaving a balance of some $118,000 remaining unapplied at the close of the war.After the war was over and the troops all home, General Scott applied to have this money, which had never been turned into the Treasury of the United States, expended in establishing such homes as he had previously recommended.This fund was the foundation of the Soldiers' Home at Washington City, and also one at Harrodsburgh, Kentucky.The latter went into disuse many years ago.In fact it never had many soldiers in it, and was, I believe, finally sold.]

Whether General Scott approved of the Mexican war and the manner in which it was brought about, I have no means of knowing.His orders to troops indicate only a soldierly spirit, with probably a little regard for the perpetuation of his own fame.On the other hand, General Taylor's, I think, indicate that he considered the administration accountable for the war, and felt no responsibility resting on himself further than for the faithful performance of his duties.Both generals deserve the commendations of their countrymen and to live in the grateful memory of this people to the latest generation.

Earlier in this narrative I have stated that the plain, reached after passing the mountains east of Perote, extends to the cities of Puebla and Mexico.The route travelled by the army before reaching Puebla, goes over a pass in a spur of mountain coming up from the south.This pass is very susceptible of defence by a smaller against a larger force.Again, the highest point of the road-bed between Vera Cruz and the City of Mexico is over Rio Frio mountain, which also might have been successfully defended by an inferior against a superior force.But by moving north of the mountains, and about thirty miles north of Puebla, both of these passes would have been avoided.The road from Perote to the City of Mexico, by this latter route, is as level as the prairies in our West.Arriving due north from Puebla, troops could have been detached to take possession of that place, and then proceeding west with the rest of the army no mountain would have been encountered before reaching the City of Mexico.It is true this road would have brought troops in by Guadalupe—a town, church and detached spur of mountain about two miles north of the capital, all bearing the same general name—and at this point Lake Texcoco comes near to the mountain, which was fortified both at the base and on the sides: but troops could have passed north of the mountain and come in only a few miles to the north-west, and so flanked the position, as they actually did on the south.

It has always seemed to me that this northern route to the City of Mexico, would have been the better one to have taken.But my later experience has taught me two lessons: first, that things are seen plainer after the events have occurred; second, that the most confident critics are generally those who know the least about the matter criticised.I know just enough about the Mexican war to approve heartily of most of the generalship, but to differ with a little of it.It is natural that an important city like Puebla should not have been passed with contempt; it may be natural that the direct road to it should have been taken; but it could have been passed, its evacuation insured and possession acquired without danger of encountering the enemy in intricate mountain defiles.In this same way the City of Mexico could have been approached without any danger of opposition, except in the open field.

But General Scott's successes are an answer to all criticism.He invaded a populous country, penetrating two hundred and sixty miles into the interior, with a force at no time equal to one-half of that opposed to him; he was without a base; the enemy was always intrenched, always on the defensive; yet he won every battle, he captured the capital, and conquered the government.Credit is due to the troops engaged, it is true, but the plans and the strategy were the general's.

I had now made marches and been in battle under both General Scott and General Taylor.The former divided his force of 10,500 men into four columns, starting a day apart, in moving from Puebla to the capital of the nation, when it was known that an army more than twice as large as his own stood ready to resist his coming.The road was broad and the country open except in crossing the Rio Frio mountain.General Taylor pursued the same course in marching toward an enemy.He moved even in smaller bodies.I never thought at the time to doubt the infallibility of these two generals in all matters pertaining to their profession.I supposed they moved in small bodies because more men could not be passed over a single road on the same day with their artillery and necessary trains.Later I found the fallacy of this belief.The rebellion, which followed as a sequence to the Mexican war, never could have been suppressed if larger bodies of men could not have been moved at the same time than was the custom under Scott and Taylor.

The victories in Mexico were, in every instance, over vastly superior numbers.There were two reasons for this.Both General Scott and General Taylor had such armies as are not often got together.At the battles of Palo Alto and Resaca-de-la-Palma, General Taylor had a small army, but it was composed exclusively of regular troops, under the best of drill and discipline.Every officer, from the highest to the lowest, was educated in his profession, not at West Point necessarily, but in the camp, in garrison, and many of them in Indian wars.The rank and file were probably inferior, as material out of which to make an army, to the volunteers that participated in all the later battles of the war; but they were brave men, and then drill and discipline brought out all there was in them.A better army, man for man, probably never faced an enemy than the one commanded by General Taylor in the earliest two engagements of the Mexican war.The volunteers who followed were of better material, but without drill or discipline at the start.They were associated with so many disciplined men and professionally educated officers, that when they went into engagements it was with a confidence they would not have felt otherwise.They became soldiers themselves almost at once.All these conditions we would enjoy again in case of war.

The Mexican army of that day was hardly an organization.The private soldier was picked up from the lower class of the inhabitants when wanted; his consent was not asked; he was poorly clothed, worse fed, and seldom paid.He was turned adrift when no longer wanted.The officers of the lower grades were but little superior to the men.With all this I have seen as brave stands made by some of these men as I have ever seen made by soldiers.Now Mexico has a standing army larger than that of the United States.They have a military school modelled after West Point.Their officers are educated and, no doubt, generally brave.The Mexican war of 1846-8 would be an impossibility in this generation.

The Mexicans have shown a patriotism which it would be well if we would imitate in part, but with more regard to truth.They celebrate the anniversaries of Chapultepec and Molino del Rey as of very great victories.The anniversaries are recognized as national holidays.At these two battles, while the United States troops were victorious, it was at very great sacrifice of life compared with what the Mexicans suffered.The Mexicans, as on many other occasions, stood up as well as any troops ever did.The trouble seemed to be the lack of experience among the officers, which led them after a certain time to simply quit, without being particularly whipped, but because they had fought enough.Their authorities of the present day grow enthusiastic over their theme when telling of these victories, and speak with pride of the large sum of money they forced us to pay in the end.With us, now twenty years after the close of the most stupendous war ever known, we have writers—who profess devotion to the nation—engaged in trying to prove that the Union forces were not victorious; practically, they say, we were slashed around from Donelson to Vicksburg and to Chattanooga; and in the East from Gettysburg to Appomattox, when the physical rebellion gave out from sheer exhaustion.There is no difference in the amount of romance in the two stories.

I would not have the anniversaries of our victories celebrated, nor those of our defeats made fast days and spent in humiliation and prayer; but I would like to see truthful history written.Such history will do full credit to the courage, endurance and soldierly ability of the American citizen, no matter what section of the country he hailed from, or in what ranks he fought.The justice of the cause which in the end prevailed, will, I doubt not, come to be acknowledged by every citizen of the land, in time.For the present, and so long as there are living witnesses of the great war of sections, there will be people who will not be consoled for the loss of a cause which they believed to be holy.As time passes, people, even of the South, will begin to wonder how it was possible that their ancestors ever fought for or justified institutions which acknowledged the right of property in man.

After the fall of the capital and the dispersal of the government of Mexico, it looked very much as if military occupation of the country for a long time might be necessary.General Scott at once began the preparation of orders, regulations and laws in view of this contingency.He contemplated making the country pay all the expenses of the occupation, without the army becoming a perceptible burden upon the people.His plan was to levy a direct tax upon the separate states, and collect, at the ports left open to trade, a duty on all imports.From the beginning of the war private property had not been taken, either for the use of the army or of individuals, without full compensation.This policy was to be pursued.There were not troops enough in the valley of Mexico to occupy many points, but now that there was no organized army of the enemy of any size, reinforcements could be got from the Rio Grande, and there were also new volunteers arriving from time to time, all by way of Vera Cruz.Military possession was taken of Cuernavaca, fifty miles south of the City of Mexico; of Toluca, nearly as far west, and of Pachuca, a mining town of great importance, some sixty miles to the north-east.Vera Cruz, Jalapa, Orizaba, and Puebla were already in our possession.

Meanwhile the Mexican government had departed in the person of Santa Anna, and it looked doubtful for a time whether the United States commissioner, Mr. Trist, would find anybody to negotiate with.A temporary government, however, was soon established at Queretaro, and Trist began negotiations for a conclusion of the war.Before terms were finally agreed upon he was ordered back to Washington, but General Scott prevailed upon him to remain, as an arrangement had been so nearly reached, and the administration must approve his acts if he succeeded in making such a treaty as had been contemplated in his instructions.The treaty was finally signed the 2d of February, 1848, and accepted by the government at Washington.It is that known as the "Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo," and secured to the United States the Rio Grande as the boundary of Texas, and the whole territory then included in New Mexico and Upper California, for the sum of $15,000,000.

Soon after entering the city of Mexico, the opposition of Generals Pillow, Worth and Colonel Duncan to General Scott became very marked.Scott claimed that they had demanded of the President his removal.I do not know whether this is so or not, but I do know of their unconcealed hostility to their chief.At last he placed them in arrest, and preferred charges against them of insubordination and disrespect.This act brought on a crisis in the career of the general commanding.He had asserted from the beginning that the administration was hostile to him; that it had failed in its promises of men and war material; that the President himself had shown duplicity if not treachery in the endeavor to procure the appointment of Benton: and the administration now gave open evidence of its enmity.About the middle of February orders came convening a court of inquiry, composed of Brevet Brigadier-General Towson, the paymaster-general of the army, Brigadier-General Cushing and Colonel Belknap, to inquire into the conduct of the accused and the accuser, and shortly afterwards orders were received from Washington, relieving Scott of the command of the army in the field and assigning Major-General William O.Butler of Kentucky to the place.This order also released Pillow, Worth and Duncan from arrest.

If a change was to be made the selection of General Butler was agreeable to every one concerned, so far as I remember to have heard expressions on the subject.There were many who regarded the treatment of General Scott as harsh and unjust.It is quite possible that the vanity of the General had led him to say and do things that afforded a plausible pretext to the administration for doing just what it did and what it had wanted to do from the start.The court tried the accuser quite as much as the accused.It was adjourned before completing its labors, to meet in Frederick, Maryland.General Scott left the country, and never after had more than the nominal command of the army until early in 1861.He certainly was not sustained in his efforts to maintain discipline in high places.

The efforts to kill off politically the two successful generals, made them both candidates for the Presidency.General Taylor was nominated in 1848, and was elected.Four years later General Scott received the nomination but was badly beaten, and the party nominating him died with his defeat.

[The Mexican war made three presidential candidates, Scott, Taylor and Pierce—and any number of aspirants for that high office. It made also governors of States, members of the cabinet, foreign ministers and other officers of high rank both in state and nation. The rebellion, which contained more war in a single day, at some critical periods, than the whole Mexican war in two years, has not been so fruitful of political results to those engaged on the Union side. On the other side, the side of the South, nearly every man who holds office of any sort whatever, either in the state or in the nation, was a Confederate soldier, but this is easily accounted for from the fact that the South was a military camp, and there were very few people of a suitable age to be in the army who were not in it.]

CHAPTER XIII.

TREATY OF PEACE—MEXICAN BULL FIGHTS—REGIMENTAL QUARTERMASTER—TRIP TO POPOCATAPETL—TRIP TO THE CAVES OF MEXICO.

The treaty of peace between the two countries was signed by the commissioners of each side early in February, 1848.It took a considerable time for it to reach Washington, receive the approval of the administration, and be finally ratified by the Senate.It was naturally supposed by the army that there would be no more fighting, and officers and men were of course anxious to get home, but knowing there must be delay they contented themselves as best they could.Every Sunday there was a bull fight for the amusement of those who would pay their fifty cents.I attended one of them—just one—not wishing to leave the country without having witnessed the national sport.The sight to me was sickening.I could not see how human beings could enjoy the sufferings of beasts, and often of men, as they seemed to do on these occasions.

At these sports there are usually from four to six bulls sacrificed.The audience occupies seats around the ring in which the exhibition is given, each seat but the foremost rising higher than the one in front, so that every one can get a full view of the sport.When all is ready a bull is turned into the ring.Three or four men come in, mounted on the merest skeletons of horses blind or blind-folded and so weak that they could not make a sudden turn with their riders without danger of falling down.The men are armed with spears having a point as sharp as a needle.Other men enter the arena on foot, armed with red flags and explosives about the size of a musket cartridge.To each of these explosives is fastened a barbed needle which serves the purpose of attaching them to the bull by running the needle into the skin.Before the animal is turned loose a lot of these explosives are attached to him.The pain from the pricking of the skin by the needles is exasperating; but when the explosions of the cartridges commence the animal becomes frantic.As he makes a lunge towards one horseman, another runs a spear into him.He turns towards his last tormentor when a man on foot holds out a red flag; the bull rushes for this and is allowed to take it on his horns.The flag drops and covers the eyes of the animal so that he is at a loss what to do; it is jerked from him and the torment is renewed.When the animal is worked into an uncontrollable frenzy, the horsemen withdraw, and the matadores—literally murderers—enter, armed with knives having blades twelve or eighteen inches long, and sharp.The trick is to dodge an attack from the animal and stab him to the heart as he passes.If these efforts fail the bull is finally lassoed, held fast and killed by driving a knife blade into the spinal column just back of the horns.He is then dragged out by horses or mules, another is let into the ring, and the same performance is renewed.

On the occasion when I was present one of the bulls was not turned aside by the attacks in the rear, the presentations of the red flag, etc., etc., but kept right on, and placing his horns under the flanks of a horse threw him and his rider to the ground with great force.The horse was killed and the rider lay prostrate as if dead.The bull was then lassoed and killed in the manner above described.Men came in and carried the dead man off in a litter.When the slaughtered bull and horse were dragged out, a fresh bull was turned into the ring.Conspicuous among the spectators was the man who had been carried out on a litter but a few minutes before.He was only dead so far as that performance went; but the corpse was so lively that it could not forego the chance of witnessing the discomfiture of some of his brethren who might not be so fortunate.There was a feeling of disgust manifested by the audience to find that he had come to life again.I confess that I felt sorry to see the cruelty to the bull and the horse.I did not stay for the conclusion of the performance; but while I did stay, there was not a bull killed in the prescribed way.

Bull fights are now prohibited in the Federal District—embracing a territory around the City of Mexico, somewhat larger than the District of Columbia—and they are not an institution in any part of the country.During one of my recent visits to Mexico, bull fights were got up in my honor at Puebla and at Pachuca.I was not notified in advance so as to be able to decline and thus prevent the performance; but in both cases I civilly declined to attend.

Another amusement of the people of Mexico of that day, and one which nearly all indulged in, male and female, old and young, priest and layman, was Monte playing.Regular feast weeks were held every year at what was then known as St.Augustin Tlalpam, eleven miles out of town.There were dealers to suit every class and condition of people.In many of the booths tlackos—the copper coin of the country, four of them making six and a quarter cents of our money—were piled up in great quantities, with some silver, to accommodate the people who could not bet more than a few pennies at a time.In other booths silver formed the bulk of the capital of the bank, with a few doubloons to be changed if there should be a run of luck against the bank.In some there was no coin except gold.Here the rich were said to bet away their entire estates in a single day.All this is stopped now.

For myself, I was kept somewhat busy during the winter of 1847-8.My regiment was stationed in Tacubaya.I was regimental quartermaster and commissary.General Scott had been unable to get clothing for the troops from the North.The men were becoming—well, they needed clothing.Material had to be purchased, such as could be obtained, and people employed to make it up into "Yankee uniforms." A quartermaster in the city was designated to attend to this special duty; but clothing was so much needed that it was seized as fast as made up.A regiment was glad to get a dozen suits at a time.I had to look after this matter for the 4th infantry.Then our regimental fund had run down and some of the musicians in the band had been without their extra pay for a number of months.

The regimental bands at that day were kept up partly by pay from the government, and partly by pay from the regimental fund.There was authority of law for enlisting a certain number of men as musicians.So many could receive the pay of non-commissioned officers of the various grades, and the remainder the pay of privates.This would not secure a band leader, nor good players on certain instruments.In garrison there are various ways of keeping up a regimental fund sufficient to give extra pay to musicians, establish libraries and ten-pin alleys, subscribe to magazines and furnish many extra comforts to the men.The best device for supplying the fund is to issue bread to the soldiers instead of flour.The ration used to be eighteen ounces per day of either flour or bread; and one hundred pounds of flour will make one hundred and forty pounds of bread.This saving was purchased by the commissary for the benefit of the fund.In the emergency the 4th infantry was laboring under, I rented a bakery in the city, hired bakers—Mexicans—bought fuel and whatever was necessary, and I also got a contract from the chief commissary of the army for baking a large amount of hard bread.In two months I made more money for the fund than my pay amounted to during the entire war.While stationed at Monterey I had relieved the post fund in the same way.There, however, was no profit except in the saving of flour by converting it into bread.

In the spring of 1848 a party of officers obtained leave to visit Popocatapetl, the highest volcano in America, and to take an escort.I went with the party, many of whom afterwards occupied conspicuous positions before the country.Of those who "went south," and attained high rank, there was Lieutenant Richard Anderson, who commanded a corps at Spottsylvania; Captain Sibley, a major-general, and, after the war, for a number of years in the employ of the Khedive of Egypt; Captain George Crittenden, a rebel general; S.B.Buckner, who surrendered Fort Donelson; and Mansfield Lovell, who commanded at New Orleans before that city fell into the hands of the National troops.Of those who remained on our side there were Captain Andrew Porter, Lieutenant C.P.Stone and Lieutenant Z.B.Tower.There were quite a number of other officers, whose names I cannot recollect.

At a little village (Ozumba) near the base of Popocatapetl, where we purposed to commence the ascent, we procured guides and two pack mules with forage for our horses.High up on the mountain there was a deserted house of one room, called the Vaqueria, which had been occupied years before by men in charge of cattle ranging on the mountain.The pasturage up there was very fine when we saw it, and there were still some cattle, descendants of the former domestic herd, which had now become wild.It was possible to go on horseback as far as the Vaqueria, though the road was somewhat hazardous in places.Sometimes it was very narrow with a yawning precipice on one side, hundreds of feet down to a roaring mountain torrent below, and almost perpendicular walls on the other side.At one of these places one of our mules loaded with two sacks of barley, one on each side, the two about as big as he was, struck his load against the mountain-side and was precipitated to the bottom.The descent was steep but not perpendicular.The mule rolled over and over until the bottom was reached, and we supposed of course the poor animal was dashed to pieces.What was our surprise, not long after we had gone into bivouac, to see the lost mule, cargo and owner coming up the ascent.The load had protected the animal from serious injury; and his owner had gone after him and found a way back to the path leading up to the hut where we were to stay.

The night at the Vaqueria was one of the most unpleasant I ever knew.It was very cold and the rain fell in torrents.A little higher up the rain ceased and snow began.The wind blew with great velocity.The log-cabin we were in had lost the roof entirely on one side, and on the other it was hardly better then a sieve.There was little or no sleep that night.As soon as it was light the next morning, we started to make the ascent to the summit.The wind continued to blow with violence and the weather was still cloudy, but there was neither rain nor snow.The clouds, however, concealed from our view the country below us, except at times a momentary glimpse could be got through a clear space between them.The wind carried the loose snow around the mountain-sides in such volumes as to make it almost impossible to stand up against it.We labored on and on, until it became evident that the top could not be reached before night, if at all in such a storm, and we concluded to return.The descent was easy and rapid, though dangerous, until we got below the snow line.At the cabin we mounted our horses, and by night were at Ozumba.

The fatigues of the day and the loss of sleep the night before drove us to bed early.Our beds consisted of a place on the dirt-floor with a blanket under us.Soon all were asleep; but long before morning first one and then another of our party began to cry out with excruciating pain in the eyes.Not one escaped it.By morning the eyes of half the party were so swollen that they were entirely closed.The others suffered pain equally.The feeling was about what might be expected from the prick of a sharp needle at a white heat.We remained in quarters until the afternoon bathing our eyes in cold water.This relieved us very much, and before night the pain had entirely left.The swelling, however, continued, and about half the party still had their eyes entirely closed; but we concluded to make a start back, those who could see a little leading the horses of those who could not see at all.We moved back to the village of Ameca Ameca, some six miles, and stopped again for the night.The next morning all were entirely well and free from pain.The weather was clear and Popocatapetl stood out in all its beauty, the top looking as if not a mile away, and inviting us to return.About half the party were anxious to try the ascent again, and concluded to do so.The remainder—I was with the remainder—concluded that we had got all the pleasure there was to be had out of mountain climbing, and that we would visit the great caves of Mexico, some ninety miles from where we then were, on the road to Acapulco.

The party that ascended the mountain the second time succeeded in reaching the crater at the top, with but little of the labor they encountered in their first attempt.Three of them—Anderson, Stone and Buckner—wrote accounts of their journey, which were published at the time.I made no notes of this excursion, and have read nothing about it since, but it seems to me that I can see the whole of it as vividly as if it were but yesterday.I have been back at Ameca Ameca, and the village beyond, twice in the last five years.The scene had not changed materially from my recollection of it.

The party which I was with moved south down the valley to the town of Cuantla, some forty miles from Ameca Ameca.The latter stands on the plain at the foot of Popocatapetl, at an elevation of about eight thousand feet above tide water.The slope down is gradual as the traveller moves south, but one would not judge that, in going to Cuantla, descent enough had been made to occasion a material change in the climate and productions of the soil; but such is the case.In the morning we left a temperate climate where the cereals and fruits are those common to the United States, we halted in the evening in a tropical climate where the orange and banana, the coffee and the sugar-cane were flourishing.We had been travelling, apparently, on a plain all day, but in the direction of the flow of water.

Soon after the capture of the City of Mexico an armistice had been agreed to, designating the limits beyond which troops of the respective armies were not to go during its continuance.Our party knew nothing about these limits.As we approached Cuantla bugles sounded the assembly, and soldiers rushed from the guard-house in the edge of the town towards us.Our party halted, and I tied a white pocket handkerchief to a stick and, using it as a flag of truce, proceeded on to the town.Captains Sibley and Porter followed a few hundred yards behind.I was detained at the guard-house until a messenger could be dispatched to the quarters of the commanding general, who authorized that I should be conducted to him.I had been with the general but a few minutes when the two officers following announced themselves.The Mexican general reminded us that it was a violation of the truce for us to be there.However, as we had no special authority from our own commanding general, and as we knew nothing about the terms of the truce, we were permitted to occupy a vacant house outside the guard for the night, with the promise of a guide to put us on the road to Cuernavaca the next morning.

Cuernavaca is a town west of Guantla.The country through which we passed, between these two towns, is tropical in climate and productions and rich in scenery.At one point, about half-way between the two places, the road goes over a low pass in the mountains in which there is a very quaint old town, the inhabitants of which at that day were nearly all full-blooded Indians.Very few of them even spoke Spanish.The houses were built of stone and generally only one story high.The streets were narrow, and had probably been paved before Cortez visited the country.They had not been graded, but the paving had been done on the natural surface.We had with us one vehicle, a cart, which was probably the first wheeled vehicle that had ever passed through that town.

On a hill overlooking this town stands the tomb of an ancient king; and it was understood that the inhabitants venerated this tomb very highly, as well as the memory of the ruler who was supposed to be buried in it.We ascended the mountain and surveyed the tomb; but it showed no particular marks of architectural taste, mechanical skill or advanced civilization.The next day we went into Cuernavaca.

After a day's rest at Cuernavaca our party set out again on the journey to the great caves of Mexico.We had proceeded but a few miles when we were stopped, as before, by a guard and notified that the terms of the existing armistice did not permit us to go further in that direction.Upon convincing the guard that we were a mere party of pleasure seekers desirous of visiting the great natural curiosities of the country which we expected soon to leave, we were conducted to a large hacienda near by, and directed to remain there until the commanding general of that department could be communicated with and his decision obtained as to whether we should be permitted to pursue our journey.The guard promised to send a messenger at once, and expected a reply by night.At night there was no response from the commanding general, but the captain of the guard was sure he would have a reply by morning.Again in the morning there was no reply.The second evening the same thing happened, and finally we learned that the guard had sent no message or messenger to the department commander.We determined therefore to go on unless stopped by a force sufficient to compel obedience.

After a few hours' travel we came to a town where a scene similar to the one at Cuantia occurred.The commanding officer sent a guide to conduct our party around the village and to put us upon our road again.This was the last interruption: that night we rested at a large coffee plantation, some eight miles from the cave we were on the way to visit.It must have been a Saturday night; the peons had been paid off, and spent part of the night in gambling away their scanty week's earnings.Their coin was principally copper, and I do not believe there was a man among them who had received as much as twenty-five cents in money.They were as much excited, however, as if they had been staking thousands.I recollect one poor fellow, who had lost his last tlacko, pulled off his shirt and, in the most excited manner, put that up on the turn of a card.Monte was the game played, the place out of doors, near the window of the room occupied by the officers of our party.

The next morning we were at the mouth of the cave at an early hour, provided with guides, candles and rockets.We explored to a distance of about three miles from the entrance, and found a succession of chambers of great dimensions and of great beauty when lit up with our rockets.Stalactites and stalagmites of all sizes were discovered.Some of the former were many feet in diameter and extended from ceiling to floor; some of the latter were but a few feet high from the floor; but the formation is going on constantly, and many centuries hence these stalagmites will extend to the ceiling and become complete columns.The stalagmites were all a little concave, and the cavities were filled with water.The water percolates through the roof, a drop at a time—often the drops several minutes apart—and more or less charged with mineral matter.Evaporation goes on slowly, leaving the mineral behind.This in time makes the immense columns, many of them thousands of tons in weight, which serve to support the roofs over the vast chambers.I recollect that at one point in the cave one of these columns is of such huge proportions that there is only a narrow passage left on either side of it.Some of our party became satisfied with their explorations before we had reached the point to which the guides were accustomed to take explorers, and started back without guides.Coming to the large column spoken of, they followed it entirely around, and commenced retracing their steps into the bowels of the mountain, without being aware of the fact.When the rest of us had completed our explorations, we started out with our guides, but had not gone far before we saw the torches of an approaching party.We could not conceive who these could be, for all of us had come in together, and there were none but ourselves at the entrance when we started in.Very soon we found it was our friends.It took them some time to conceive how they had got where they were.They were sure they had kept straight on for the mouth of the cave, and had gone about far enough to have reached it.

CHAPTER XIV.

RETURN OF THE ARMY—MARRIAGE—ORDERED TO THE PACIFIC COAST—CROSSING THE ISTHMUS—ARRIVAL AT SAN FRANCISCO.

My experience in the Mexican war was of great advantage to me afterwards.Besides the many practical lessons it taught, the war brought nearly all the officers of the regular army together so as to make them personally acquainted.It also brought them in contact with volunteers, many of whom served in the war of the rebellion afterwards.Then, in my particular case, I had been at West Point at about the right time to meet most of the graduates who were of a suitable age at the breaking out of the rebellion to be trusted with large commands.Graduating in 1843, I was at the military academy from one to four years with all cadets who graduated between 1840 and 1846—seven classes.These classes embraced more than fifty officers who afterwards became generals on one side or the other in the rebellion, many of them holding high commands.All the older officers, who became conspicuous in the rebellion, I had also served with and known in Mexico: Lee, J.E.Johnston, A.S.Johnston, Holmes, Hebert and a number of others on the Confederate side; McCall, Mansfield, Phil.Kearney and others on the National side.The acquaintance thus formed was of immense service to me in the war of the rebellion—I mean what I learned of the characters of those to whom I was afterwards opposed.I do not pretend to say that all movements, or even many of them, were made with special reference to the characteristics of the commander against whom they were directed.But my appreciation of my enemies was certainly affected by this knowledge.The natural disposition of most people is to clothe a commander of a large army whom they do not know, with almost superhuman abilities.A large part of the National army, for instance, and most of the press of the country, clothed General Lee with just such qualities, but I had known him personally, and knew that he was mortal; and it was just as well that I felt this.

The treaty of peace was at last ratified, and the evacuation of Mexico by United States troops was ordered.Early in June the troops in the City of Mexico began to move out.Many of them, including the brigade to which I belonged, were assembled at Jalapa, above the vomito, to await the arrival of transports at Vera Cruz: but with all this precaution my regiment and others were in camp on the sand beach in a July sun, for about a week before embarking, while the fever raged with great virulence in Vera Cruz, not two miles away.I can call to mind only one person, an officer, who died of the disease.My regiment was sent to Pascagoula, Mississippi, to spend the summer.As soon as it was settled in camp I obtained a leave of absence for four months and proceeded to St.Louis.On the 22d of August, 1848, I was married to Miss Julia Dent, the lady of whom I have before spoken.We visited my parents and relations in Ohio, and, at the end of my leave, proceeded to my post at Sackett's Harbor, New York.In April following I was ordered to Detroit, Michigan, where two years were spent with but few important incidents.

The present constitution of the State of Michigan was ratified during this time.By the terms of one of its provisions, all citizens of the United States residing within the State at the time of the ratification became citizens of Michigan also.During my stay in Detroit there was an election for city officers.Mr. Zachariah Chandler was the candidate of the Whigs for the office of Mayor, and was elected, although the city was then reckoned democratic.All the officers stationed there at the time who offered their votes were permitted to cast them.I did not offer mine, however, as I did not wish to consider myself a citizen of Michigan.This was Mr. Chandler's first entry into politics, a career he followed ever after with great success, and in which he died enjoying the friendship, esteem and love of his countrymen.

In the spring of 1851 the garrison at Detroit was transferred to Sackett's Harbor, and in the following spring the entire 4th infantry was ordered to the Pacific Coast.It was decided that Mrs. Grant should visit my parents at first for a few months, and then remain with her own family at their St.Louis home until an opportunity offered of sending for her.In the month of April the regiment was assembled at Governor's Island, New York Harbor, and on the 5th of July eight companies sailed for Aspinwall.We numbered a little over seven hundred persons, including the families of officers and soldiers.Passage was secured for us on the old steamer Ohio, commanded at the time by Captain Schenck, of the navy.It had not been determined, until a day or two before starting, that the 4th infantry should go by the Ohio; consequently, a complement of passengers had already been secured.The addition of over seven hundred to this list crowded the steamer most uncomfortably, especially for the tropics in July.

In eight days Aspinwall was reached.At that time the streets of the town were eight or ten inches under water, and foot passengers passed from place to place on raised foot-walks.July is at the height of the wet season, on the Isthmus.At intervals the rain would pour down in streams, followed in not many minutes by a blazing, tropical summer's sun.These alternate changes, from rain to sunshine, were continuous in the afternoons.I wondered how any person could live many months in Aspinwall, and wondered still more why any one tried.

In the summer of 1852 the Panama railroad was completed only to the point where it now crosses the Chagres River.From there passengers were carried by boats to Gorgona, at which place they took mules for Panama, some twenty-five miles further.Those who travelled over the Isthmus in those days will remember that boats on the Chagres River were propelled by natives not inconveniently burdened with clothing.These boats carried thirty to forty passengers each.The crews consisted of six men to a boat, armed with long poles.There were planks wide enough for a man to walk on conveniently, running along the sides of each boat from end to end.The men would start from the bow, place one end of their poles against the river bottom, brace their shoulders against the other end, and then walk to the stern as rapidly as they could.In this way from a mile to a mile and a half an hour could be made, against the current of the river.

I, as regimental quartermaster, had charge of the public property and had also to look after the transportation.A contract had been entered into with the steamship company in New York for the transportation of the regiment to California, including the Isthmus transit.A certain amount of baggage was allowed per man, and saddle animals were to be furnished to commissioned officers and to all disabled persons.The regiment, with the exception of one company left as guards to the public property—camp and garrison equipage principally—and the soldiers with families, took boats, propelled as above described, for Gorgona.From this place they marched to Panama, and were soon comfortably on the steamer anchored in the bay, some three or four miles from the town.I, with one company of troops and all the soldiers with families, all the tents, mess chests and camp kettles, was sent to Cruces, a town a few miles higher up the Chagres River than Gorgona.There I found an impecunious American who had taken the contract to furnish transportation for the regiment at a stipulated price per hundred pounds for the freight and so much for each saddle animal.But when we reached Cruces there was not a mule, either for pack or saddle, in the place.The contractor promised that the animals should be on hand in the morning.In the morning he said that they were on the way from some imaginary place, and would arrive in the course of the day.This went on until I saw that he could not procure the animals at all at the price he had promised to furnish them for.The unusual number of passengers that had come over on the steamer, and the large amount of freight to pack, had created an unprecedented demand for mules.Some of the passengers paid as high as forty dollars for the use of a mule to ride twenty-five miles, when the mule would not have sold for ten dollars in that market at other times.Meanwhile the cholera had broken out, and men were dying every hour.To diminish the food for the disease, I permitted the company detailed with me to proceed to Panama.The captain and the doctors accompanied the men, and I was left alone with the sick and the soldiers who had families.The regiment at Panama was also affected with the disease; but there were better accommodations for the well on the steamer, and a hospital, for those taken with the disease, on an old hulk anchored a mile off.There were also hospital tents on shore on the island of Flamingo, which stands in the bay.

I was about a week at Cruces before transportation began to come in.About one-third of the people with me died, either at Cruces or on the way to Panama.There was no agent of the transportation company at Cruces to consult, or to take the responsibility of procuring transportation at a price which would secure it.I therefore myself dismissed the contractor and made a new contract with a native, at more than double the original price.Thus we finally reached Panama.The steamer, however, could not proceed until the cholera abated, and the regiment was detained still longer.Altogether, on the Isthmus and on the Pacific side, we were delayed six weeks.About one-seventh of those who left New York harbor with the 4th infantry on the 5th of July, now lie buried on the Isthmus of Panama or on Flamingo island in Panama Bay.

One amusing circumstance occurred while we were lying at anchor in Panama Bay.In the regiment there was a Lieutenant Slaughter who was very liable to sea-sickness.It almost made him sick to see the wave of a table-cloth when the servants were spreading it.Soon after his graduation, Slaughter was ordered to California and took passage by a sailing vessel going around Cape Horn.The vessel was seven months making the voyage, and Slaughter was sick every moment of the time, never more so than while lying at anchor after reaching his place of destination.On landing in California he found orders which had come by the Isthmus, notifying him of a mistake in his assignment; he should have been ordered to the northern lakes.He started back by the Isthmus route and was sick all the way.But when he arrived at the East he was again ordered to California, this time definitely, and at this date was making his third trip.He was as sick as ever, and had been so for more than a month while lying at anchor in the bay.I remember him well, seated with his elbows on the table in front of him, his chin between his hands, and looking the picture of despair.At last he broke out, "I wish I had taken my father's advice; he wanted me to go into the navy; if I had done so, I should not have had to go to sea so much."Poor Slaughter!it was his last sea voyage.He was killed by Indians in Oregon.

By the last of August the cholera had so abated that it was deemed safe to start.The disease did not break out again on the way to California, and we reached San Francisco early in September.

CHAPTER XV.

SAN FRANCISCO—EARLY CALIFORNIA EXPERIENCES—LIFE ON THE PACIFIC COAST—PROMOTED CAPTAIN—FLUSH TIMES IN CALIFORNIA.

San Francisco at that day was a lively place.Gold, or placer digging as it was called, was at its height.Steamers plied daily between San Francisco and both Stockton and Sacramento.Passengers and gold from the southern mines came by the Stockton boat; from the northern mines by Sacramento.In the evening when these boats arrived, Long Wharf—there was but one wharf in San Francisco in 1852—was alive with people crowding to meet the miners as they came down to sell their "dust" and to "have a time."Of these some were runners for hotels, boarding houses or restaurants; others belonged to a class of impecunious adventurers, of good manners and good presence, who were ever on the alert to make the acquaintance of people with some ready means, in the hope of being asked to take a meal at a restaurant.Many were young men of good family, good education and gentlemanly instincts.Their parents had been able to support them during their minority, and to give them good educations, but not to maintain them afterwards.From 1849 to 1853 there was a rush of people to the Pacific coast, of the class described.All thought that fortunes were to be picked up, without effort, in the gold fields on the Pacific.Some realized more than their most sanguine expectations; but for one such there were hundreds disappointed, many of whom now fill unknown graves; others died wrecks of their former selves, and many, without a vicious instinct, became criminals and outcasts.Many of the real scenes in early California life exceed in strangeness and interest any of the mere products of the brain of the novelist.

Those early days in California brought out character.It was a long way off then, and the journey was expensive.The fortunate could go by Cape Horn or by the Isthmus of Panama; but the mass of pioneers crossed the plains with their ox-teams. This took an entire summer.They were very lucky when they got through with a yoke of worn-out cattle.All other means were exhausted in procuring the outfit on the Missouri River.The immigrant, on arriving, found himself a stranger, in a strange land, far from friends.Time pressed, for the little means that could be realized from the sale of what was left of the outfit would not support a man long at California prices.Many became discouraged.Others would take off their coats and look for a job, no matter what it might be.These succeeded as a rule.There were many young men who had studied professions before they went to California, and who had never done a day's manual labor in their lives, who took in the situation at once and went to work to make a start at anything they could get to do.Some supplied carpenters and masons with material—carrying plank, brick, or mortar, as the case might be; others drove stages, drays, or baggage wagons, until they could do better.More became discouraged early and spent their time looking up people who would "treat," or lounging about restaurants and gambling houses where free lunches were furnished daily.They were welcomed at these places because they often brought in miners who proved good customers.

My regiment spent a few weeks at Benicia barracks, and then was ordered to Fort Vancouver, on the Columbia River, then in Oregon Territory.During the winter of 1852-3 the territory was divided, all north of the Columbia River being taken from Oregon to make Washington Territory.

Prices for all kinds of supplies were so high on the Pacific coast from 1849 until at least 1853—that it would have been impossible for officers of the army to exist upon their pay, if it had not been that authority was given them to purchase from the commissary such supplies as he kept, at New Orleans wholesale prices.A cook could not be hired for the pay of a captain.The cook could do better.At Benicia, in 1852, flour was 25 cents per pound; potatoes were 16 cents; beets, turnips and cabbage, 6 cents; onions, 37 1/2 cents; meat and other articles in proportion.In 1853 at Vancouver vegetables were a little lower.I with three other officers concluded that we would raise a crop for ourselves, and by selling the surplus realize something handsome.I bought a pair of horses that had crossed the plains that summer and were very poor.They recuperated rapidly, however, and proved a good team to break up the ground with.I performed all the labor of breaking up the ground while the other officers planted the potatoes.Our crop was enormous.Luckily for us the Columbia River rose to a great height from the melting of the snow in the mountains in June, and overflowed and killed most of our crop.This saved digging it up, for everybody on the Pacific coast seemed to have come to the conclusion at the same time that agriculture would be profitable.In 1853 more than three-quarters of the potatoes raised were permitted to rot in the ground, or had to be thrown away.The only potatoes we sold were to our own mess.

While I was stationed on the Pacific coast we were free from Indian wars.There were quite a number of remnants of tribes in the vicinity of Portland in Oregon, and of Fort Vancouver in Washington Territory.They had generally acquired some of the vices of civilization, but none of the virtues, except in individual cases.The Hudson's Bay Company had held the North-west with their trading posts for many years before the United States was represented on the Pacific coast.They still retained posts along the Columbia River and one at Fort Vancouver, when I was there.Their treatment of the Indians had brought out the better qualities of the savages.Farming had been undertaken by the company to supply the Indians with bread and vegetables; they raised some cattle and horses; and they had now taught the Indians to do the labor of the farm and herd.They always compensated them for their labor, and always gave them goods of uniform quality and at uniform price.

Before the advent of the American, the medium of exchange between the Indian and the white man was pelts.Afterward it was silver coin.If an Indian received in the sale of a horse a fifty dollar gold piece, not an infrequent occurrence, the first thing he did was to exchange it for American half dollars.These he could count.He would then commence his purchases, paying for each article separately, as he got it.He would not trust any one to add up the bill and pay it all at once.At that day fifty dollar gold pieces, not the issue of the government, were common on the Pacific coast.They were called slugs.

The Indians, along the lower Columbia as far as the Cascades and on the lower Willamette, died off very fast during the year I spent in that section; for besides acquiring the vices of the white people they had acquired also their diseases.The measles and the small-pox were both amazingly fatal.In their wild state, before the appearance of the white man among them, the principal complaints they were subject to were those produced by long involuntary fasting, violent exercise in pursuit of game, and over-eating.Instinct more than reason had taught them a remedy for these ills.It was the steam bath.Something like a bake-oven was built, large enough to admit a man lying down.Bushes were stuck in the ground in two rows, about six feet long and some two or three feet apart; other bushes connected the rows at one end.The tops of the bushes were drawn together to interlace, and confined in that position; the whole was then plastered over with wet clay until every opening was filled.Just inside the open end of the oven the floor was scooped out so as to make a hole that would hold a bucket or two of water.These ovens were always built on the banks of a stream, a big spring, or pool of water.When a patient required a bath, a fire was built near the oven and a pile of stones put upon it.The cavity at the front was then filled with water.When the stones were sufficiently heated, the patient would draw himself into the oven; a blanket would be thrown over the open end, and hot stones put into the water until the patient could stand it no longer.He was then withdrawn from his steam bath and doused into the cold stream near by.This treatment may have answered with the early ailments of the Indians.With the measles or small-pox it would kill every time.

During my year on the Columbia River, the small-pox exterminated one small remnant of a band of Indians entirely, and reduced others materially.I do not think there was a case of recovery among them, until the doctor with the Hudson Bay Company took the matter in hand and established a hospital.Nearly every case he treated recovered.I never, myself, saw the treatment described in the preceding paragraph, but have heard it described by persons who have witnessed it.The decimation among the Indians I knew of personally, and the hospital, established for their benefit, was a Hudson's Bay building not a stone's throw from my own quarters.

The death of Colonel Bliss, of the Adjutant General's department, which occurred July 5th, 1853, promoted me to the captaincy of a company then stationed at Humboldt Bay, California.The notice reached me in September of the same year, and I very soon started to join my new command.There was no way of reaching Humboldt at that time except to take passage on a San Francisco sailing vessel going after lumber.Red wood, a species of cedar, which on the Pacific coast takes the place filled by white pine in the East, then abounded on the banks of Humboldt Bay.There were extensive saw-mills engaged in preparing this lumber for the San Francisco market, and sailing vessels, used in getting it to market, furnished the only means of communication between Humboldt and the balance of the world.

I was obliged to remain in San Francisco for several days before I found a vessel.This gave me a good opportunity of comparing the San Francisco of 1852 with that of 1853.As before stated, there had been but one wharf in front of the city in 1852—Long Wharf.In 1853 the town had grown out into the bay beyond what was the end of this wharf when I first saw it.Streets and houses had been built out on piles where the year before the largest vessels visiting the port lay at anchor or tied to the wharf.There was no filling under the streets or houses.San Francisco presented the same general appearance as the year before; that is, eating, drinking and gambling houses were conspicuous for their number and publicity.They were on the first floor, with doors wide open.At all hours of the day and night in walking the streets, the eye was regaled, on every block near the water front, by the sight of players at faro.Often broken places were found in the street, large enough to let a man down into the water below.I have but little doubt that many of the people who went to the Pacific coast in the early days of the gold excitement, and have never been heard from since, or who were heard from for a time and then ceased to write, found watery graves beneath the houses or streets built over San Francisco Bay.

Besides the gambling in cards there was gambling on a larger scale in city lots.These were sold "On Change," much as stocks are now sold on Wall Street.Cash, at time of purchase, was always paid by the broker; but the purchaser had only to put up his margin.He was charged at the rate of two or three per cent.a month on the difference, besides commissions.The sand hills, some of them almost inaccessible to foot-passengers, were surveyed off and mapped into fifty vara lots—a vara being a Spanish yard.These were sold at first at very low prices, but were sold and resold for higher prices until they went up to many thousands of dollars.The brokers did a fine business, and so did many such purchasers as were sharp enough to quit purchasing before the final crash came.As the city grew, the sand hills back of the town furnished material for filling up the bay under the houses and streets, and still further out.The temporary houses, first built over the water in the harbor, soon gave way to more solid structures.The main business part of the city now is on solid ground, made where vessels of the largest class lay at anchor in the early days.I was in San Francisco again in 1854.Gambling houses had disappeared from public view.The city had become staid and orderly.

CHAPTER XVI.

RESIGNATION—PRIVATE LIFE—LIFE AT GALENA—THE COMING CRISIS.

My family, all this while, was at the East.It consisted now of a wife and two children.I saw no chance of supporting them on the Pacific coast out of my pay as an army officer.I concluded, therefore, to resign, and in March applied for a leave of absence until the end of the July following, tendering my resignation to take effect at the end of that time.I left the Pacific coast very much attached to it, and with the full expectation of making it my future home.That expectation and that hope remained uppermost in my mind until the Lieutenant-Generalcy bill was introduced into Congress in the winter of 1863-4.The passage of that bill, and my promotion, blasted my last hope of ever becoming a citizen of the further West.

In the late summer of 1854 I rejoined my family, to find in it a son whom I had never seen, born while I was on the Isthmus of Panama.I was now to commence, at the age of thirty-two, a new struggle for our support.My wife had a farm near St.Louis, to which we went, but I had no means to stock it.A house had to be built also.I worked very hard, never losing a day because of bad weather, and accomplished the object in a moderate way.If nothing else could be done I would load a cord of wood on a wagon and take it to the city for sale.I managed to keep along very well until 1858, when I was attacked by fever and ague.I had suffered very severely and for a long time from this disease, while a boy in Ohio.It lasted now over a year, and, while it did not keep me in the house, it did interfere greatly with the amount of work I was able to perform.In the fall of 1858 I sold out my stock, crops and farming utensils at auction, and gave up farming.

In the winter I established a partnership with Harry Boggs, a cousin of Mrs. Grant, in the real estate agency business.I spent that winter at St.Louis myself, but did not take my family into town until the spring.Our business might have become prosperous if I had been able to wait for it to grow.As it was, there was no more than one person could attend to, and not enough to support two families.While a citizen of St.Louis and engaged in the real estate agency business, I was a candidate for the office of county engineer, an office of respectability and emolument which would have been very acceptable to me at that time.The incumbent was appointed by the county court, which consisted of five members.My opponent had the advantage of birth over me (he was a citizen by adoption) and carried off the prize.I now withdrew from the co-partnership with Boggs, and, in May, 1860, removed to Galena, Illinois, and took a clerkship in my father's store.

While a citizen of Missouri, my first opportunity for casting a vote at a Presidential election occurred.I had been in the army from before attaining my majority and had thought but little about politics, although I was a Whig by education and a great admirer of Mr. Clay.But the Whig party had ceased to exist before I had an opportunity of exercising the privilege of casting a ballot; the Know-Nothing party had taken its place, but was on the wane; and the Republican party was in a chaotic state and had not yet received a name.It had no existence in the Slave States except at points on the borders next to Free States.In St.Louis City and County, what afterwards became the Republican party was known as the Free-Soil Democracy, led by the Honorable Frank P.Blair.Most of my neighbors had known me as an officer of the army with Whig proclivities.They had been on the same side, and, on the death of their party, many had become Know-Nothings, or members of the American party.There was a lodge near my new home, and I was invited to join it.I accepted the invitation; was initiated; attended a meeting just one week later, and never went to another afterwards.

I have no apologies to make for having been one week a member of the American party; for I still think native-born citizens of the United States should have as much protection, as many privileges in their native country, as those who voluntarily select it for a home.But all secret, oath-bound political parties are dangerous to any nation, no matter how pure or how patriotic the motives and principles which first bring them together.No political party can or ought to exist when one of its corner-stones is opposition to freedom of thought and to the right to worship God "according to the dictate of one's own conscience," or according to the creed of any religious denomination whatever.Nevertheless, if a sect sets up its laws as binding above the State laws, wherever the two come in conflict this claim must be resisted and suppressed at whatever cost.

Up to the Mexican war there were a few out and out abolitionists, men who carried their hostility to slavery into all elections, from those for a justice of the peace up to the Presidency of the United States.They were noisy but not numerous.But the great majority of people at the North, where slavery did not exist, were opposed to the institution, and looked upon its existence in any part of the country as unfortunate.They did not hold the States where slavery existed responsible for it; and believed that protection should be given to the right of property in slaves until some satisfactory way could be reached to be rid of the institution.Opposition to slavery was not a creed of either political party.In some sections more anti-slavery men belonged to the Democratic party, and in others to the Whigs.But with the inauguration of the Mexican war, in fact with the annexation of Texas, "the inevitable conflict" commenced.

As the time for the Presidential election of 1856—the first at which I had the opportunity of voting—approached, party feeling began to run high.The Republican party was regarded in the South and the border States not only as opposed to the extension of slavery, but as favoring the compulsory abolition of the institution without compensation to the owners.The most horrible visions seemed to present themselves to the minds of people who, one would suppose, ought to have known better.Many educated and, otherwise, sensible persons appeared to believe that emancipation meant social equality.Treason to the Government was openly advocated and was not rebuked.It was evident to my mind that the election of a Republican President in 1856 meant the secession of all the Slave States, and rebellion.Under these circumstances I preferred the success of a candidate whose election would prevent or postpone secession, to seeing the country plunged into a war the end of which no man could foretell.With a Democrat elected by the unanimous vote of the Slave States, there could be no pretext for secession for four years.I very much hoped that the passions of the people would subside in that time, and the catastrophe be averted altogether; if it was not, I believed the country would be better prepared to receive the shock and to resist it.I therefore voted for James Buchanan for President.Four years later the Republican party was successful in electing its candidate to the Presidency.The civilized world has learned the consequence.Four millions of human beings held as chattels have been liberated; the ballot has been given to them; the free schools of the country have been opened to their children.The nation still lives, and the people are just as free to avoid social intimacy with the blacks as ever they were, or as they are with white people.

While living in Galena I was nominally only a clerk supporting myself and family on a stipulated salary.In reality my position was different.My father had never lived in Galena himself, but had established my two brothers there, the one next younger than myself in charge of the business, assisted by the youngest.When I went there it was my father's intention to give up all connection with the business himself, and to establish his three sons in it: but the brother who had really built up the business was sinking with consumption, and it was not thought best to make any change while he was in this condition.He lived until September, 1861, when he succumbed to that insidious disease which always flatters its victims into the belief that they are growing better up to the close of life.A more honorable man never transacted business.In September, 1861, I was engaged in an employment which required all my attention elsewhere.

During the eleven months that I lived in Galena prior to the first call for volunteers, I had been strictly attentive to my business, and had made but few acquaintances other than customers and people engaged in the same line with myself.When the election took place in November, 1860, I had not been a resident of Illinois long enough to gain citizenship and could not, therefore, vote.I was really glad of this at the time, for my pledges would have compelled me to vote for Stephen A.Douglas, who had no possible chance of election.The contest was really between Mr. Breckinridge and Mr. Lincoln; between minority rule and rule by the majority.I wanted, as between these candidates, to see Mr. Lincoln elected.Excitement ran high during the canvass, and torch-light processions enlivened the scene in the generally quiet streets of Galena many nights during the campaign.I did not parade with either party, but occasionally met with the "wide awakes"—Republicans—in their rooms, and superintended their drill.It was evident, from the time of the Chicago nomination to the close of the canvass, that the election of the Republican candidate would be the signal for some of the Southern States to secede.I still had hopes that the four years which had elapsed since the first nomination of a Presidential candidate by a party distinctly opposed to slavery extension, had given time for the extreme pro-slavery sentiment to cool down; for the Southerners to think well before they took the awful leap which they had so vehemently threatened.But I was mistaken.

The Republican candidate was elected, and solid substantial people of the North-west, and I presume the same order of people throughout the entire North, felt very serious, but determined, after this event.It was very much discussed whether the South would carry out its threat to secede and set up a separate government, the corner-stone of which should be, protection to the "Divine" institution of slavery.For there were people who believed in the "divinity" of human slavery, as there are now people who believe Mormonism and Polygamy to be ordained by the Most High.We forgive them for entertaining such notions, but forbid their practice.It was generally believed that there would be a flurry; that some of the extreme Southern States would go so far as to pass ordinances of secession.But the common impression was that this step was so plainly suicidal for the South, that the movement would not spread over much of the territory and would not last long.

Doubtless the founders of our government, the majority of them at least, regarded the confederation of the colonies as an experiment.Each colony considered itself a separate government; that the confederation was for mutual protection against a foreign foe, and the prevention of strife and war among themselves.If there had been a desire on the part of any single State to withdraw from the compact at any time while the number of States was limited to the original thirteen, I do not suppose there would have been any to contest the right, no matter how much the determination might have been regretted.The problem changed on the ratification of the Constitution by all the colonies; it changed still more when amendments were added; and if the right of any one State to withdraw continued to exist at all after the ratification of the Constitution, it certainly ceased on the formation of new States, at least so far as the new States themselves were concerned.It was never possessed at all by Florida or the States west of the Mississippi, all of which were purchased by the treasury of the entire nation.Texas and the territory brought into the Union in consequence of annexation, were purchased with both blood and treasure; and Texas, with a domain greater than that of any European state except Russia, was permitted to retain as state property all the public lands within its borders.It would have been ingratitude and injustice of the most flagrant sort for this State to withdraw from the Union after all that had been spent and done to introduce her; yet, if separation had actually occurred, Texas must necessarily have gone with the South, both on account of her institutions and her geographical position.Secession was illogical as well as impracticable; it was revolution.

Now, the right of revolution is an inherent one.When people are oppressed by their government, it is a natural right they enjoy to relieve themselves of the oppression, if they are strong enough, either by withdrawal from it, or by overthrowing it and substituting a government more acceptable.But any people or part of a people who resort to this remedy, stake their lives, their property, and every claim for protection given by citizenship—on the issue.Victory, or the conditions imposed by the conqueror—must be the result.

In the case of the war between the States it would have been the exact truth if the South had said,—"We do not want to live with you Northern people any longer; we know our institution of slavery is obnoxious to you, and, as you are growing numerically stronger than we, it may at some time in the future be endangered.So long as you permitted us to control the government, and with the aid of a few friends at the North to enact laws constituting your section a guard against the escape of our property, we were willing to live with you.You have been submissive to our rule heretofore; but it looks now as if you did not intend to continue so, and we will remain in the Union no longer."Instead of this the seceding States cried lustily,—"Let us alone; you have no constitutional power to interfere with us."Newspapers and people at the North reiterated the cry.Individuals might ignore the constitution; but the Nation itself must not only obey it, but must enforce the strictest construction of that instrument; the construction put upon it by the Southerners themselves.The fact is the constitution did not apply to any such contingency as the one existing from 1861 to 1865.Its framers never dreamed of such a contingency occurring.If they had foreseen it, the probabilities are they would have sanctioned the right of a State or States to withdraw rather than that there should be war between brothers.

The framers were wise in their generation and wanted to do the very best possible to secure their own liberty and independence, and that also of their descendants to the latest days.It is preposterous to suppose that the people of one generation can lay down the best and only rules of government for all who are to come after them, and under unforeseen contingencies.At the time of the framing of our constitution the only physical forces that had been subdued and made to serve man and do his labor, were the currents in the streams and in the air we breathe.Rude machinery, propelled by water power, had been invented; sails to propel ships upon the waters had been set to catch the passing breeze—but the application of stream to propel vessels against both wind and current, and machinery to do all manner of work had not been thought of.The instantaneous transmission of messages around the world by means of electricity would probably at that day have been attributed to witchcraft or a league with the Devil.Immaterial circumstances had changed as greatly as material ones.We could not and ought not to be rigidly bound by the rules laid down under circumstances so different for emergencies so utterly unanticipated.The fathers themselves would have been the first to declare that their prerogatives were not irrevocable.They would surely have resisted secession could they have lived to see the shape it assumed.

I travelled through the Northwest considerably during the winter of 1860-1.We had customers in all the little towns in south-west Wisconsin, south-east Minnesota and north-east Iowa.These generally knew I had been a captain in the regular army and had served through the Mexican war.Consequently wherever I stopped at night, some of the people would come to the public-house where I was, and sit till a late hour discussing the probabilities of the future.My own views at that time were like those officially expressed by Mr. Seward at a later day, that "the war would be over in ninety days."I continued to entertain these views until after the battle of Shiloh.I believe now that there would have been no more battles at the West after the capture of Fort Donelson if all the troops in that region had been under a single commander who would have followed up that victory.

There is little doubt in my mind now that the prevailing sentiment of the South would have been opposed to secession in 1860 and 1861, if there had been a fair and calm expression of opinion, unbiased by threats, and if the ballot of one legal voter had counted for as much as that of any other.But there was no calm discussion of the question.Demagogues who were too old to enter the army if there should be a war, others who entertained so high an opinion of their own ability that they did not believe they could be spared from the direction of the affairs of state in such an event, declaimed vehemently and unceasingly against the North; against its aggressions upon the South; its interference with Southern rights, etc., etc. They denounced the Northerners as cowards, poltroons, negro-worshippers; claimed that one Southern man was equal to five Northern men in battle; that if the South would stand up for its rights the North would back down.Mr. Jefferson Davis said in a speech, delivered at La Grange, Mississippi, before the secession of that State, that he would agree to drink all the blood spilled south of Mason and Dixon's line if there should be a war.The young men who would have the fighting to do in case of war, believed all these statements, both in regard to the aggressiveness of the North and its cowardice.They, too, cried out for a separation from such people.The great bulk of the legal voters of the South were men who owned no slaves; their homes were generally in the hills and poor country; their facilities for educating their children, even up to the point of reading and writing, were very limited; their interest in the contest was very meagre—what there was, if they had been capable of seeing it, was with the North; they too needed emancipation.Under the old regime they were looked down upon by those who controlled all the affairs in the interest of slave-owners, as poor white trash who were allowed the ballot so long as they cast it according to direction.

I am aware that this last statement may be disputed and individual testimony perhaps adduced to show that in ante-bellum days the ballot was as untrammelled in the south as in any section of the country; but in the face of any such contradiction I reassert the statement.The shot-gun was not resorted to.Masked men did not ride over the country at night intimidating voters; but there was a firm feeling that a class existed in every State with a sort of divine right to control public affairs.If they could not get this control by one means they must by another.The end justified the means.The coercion, if mild, was complete.

There were two political parties, it is true, in all the States, both strong in numbers and respectability, but both equally loyal to the institution which stood paramount in Southern eyes to all other institutions in state or nation.The slave-owners were the minority, but governed both parties.Had politics ever divided the slave-holders and the non-slave-holders, the majority would have been obliged to yield, or internecine war would have been the consequence.I do not know that the Southern people were to blame for this condition of affairs.There was a time when slavery was not profitable, and the discussion of the merits of the institution was confined almost exclusively to the territory where it existed.The States of Virginia and Kentucky came near abolishing slavery by their own acts, one State defeating the measure by a tie vote and the other only lacking one.But when the institution became profitable, all talk of its abolition ceased where it existed; and naturally, as human nature is constituted, arguments were adduced in its support.The cotton-gin probably had much to do with the justification of slavery.

The winter of 1860-1 will be remembered by middle-aged people of to-day as one of great excitement.South Carolina promptly seceded after the result of the Presidential election was known.Other Southern States proposed to follow.In some of them the Union sentiment was so strong that it had to be suppressed by force.Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky and Missouri, all Slave States, failed to pass ordinances of secession; but they were all represented in the so-called congress of the so-called Confederate States.The Governor and Lieutenant-Governor of Missouri, in 1861, Jackson and Reynolds, were both supporters of the rebellion and took refuge with the enemy.The governor soon died, and the lieutenant-governor assumed his office; issued proclamations as governor of the State; was recognized as such by the Confederate Government, and continued his pretensions until the collapse of the rebellion.The South claimed the sovereignty of States, but claimed the right to coerce into their confederation such States as they wanted, that is, all the States where slavery existed.They did not seem to think this course inconsistent.The fact is, the Southern slave-owners believed that, in some way, the ownership of slaves conferred a sort of patent of nobility—a right to govern independent of the interest or wishes of those who did not hold such property.They convinced themselves, first, of the divine origin of the institution and, next, that that particular institution was not safe in the hands of any body of legislators but themselves.

Meanwhile the Administration of President Buchanan looked helplessly on and proclaimed that the general government had no power to interfere; that the Nation had no power to save its own life.Mr. Buchanan had in his cabinet two members at least, who were as earnest—to use a mild term—in the cause of secession as Mr. Davis or any Southern statesman.One of them, Floyd, the Secretary of War, scattered the army so that much of it could be captured when hostilities should commence, and distributed the cannon and small arms from Northern arsenals throughout the South so as to be on hand when treason wanted them.The navy was scattered in like manner.The President did not prevent his cabinet preparing for war upon their government, either by destroying its resources or storing them in the South until a de facto government was established with Jefferson Davis as its President, and Montgomery, Alabama, as the Capital.The secessionists had then to leave the cabinet.In their own estimation they were aliens in the country which had given them birth.Loyal men were put into their places.Treason in the executive branch of the government was estopped.But the harm had already been done.The stable door was locked after the horse had been stolen.

During all of the trying winter of 1860-1, when the Southerners were so defiant that they would not allow within their borders the expression of a sentiment hostile to their views, it was a brave man indeed who could stand up and proclaim his loyalty to the Union.On the other hand men at the North—prominent men—proclaimed that the government had no power to coerce the South into submission to the laws of the land; that if the North undertook to raise armies to go south, these armies would have to march over the dead bodies of the speakers.A portion of the press of the North was constantly proclaiming similar views.When the time arrived for the President-elect to go to the capital of the Nation to be sworn into office, it was deemed unsafe for him to travel, not only as a President-elect, but as any private citizen should be allowed to do.Instead of going in a special car, receiving the good wishes of his constituents at all the stations along the road, he was obliged to stop on the way and to be smuggled into the capital.He disappeared from public view on his journey, and the next the country knew, his arrival was announced at the capital.There is little doubt that he would have been assassinated if he had attempted to travel openly throughout his journey.

CHAPTER XVII.

OUTBREAK OF THE REBELLION—PRESIDING AT A UNION MEETING—MUSTERING OFFICER OF STATE TROOPS—LYON AT CAMP JACKSON—SERVICES TENDERED TO THE GOVERNMENT.

The 4th of March, 1861, came, and Abraham Lincoln was sworn to maintain the Union against all its enemies.The secession of one State after another followed, until eleven had gone out.On the 11th of April Fort Sumter, a National fort in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina, was fired upon by the Southerners and a few days after was captured.The Confederates proclaimed themselves aliens, and thereby debarred themselves of all right to claim protection under the Constitution of the United States.We did not admit the fact that they were aliens, but all the same, they debarred themselves of the right to expect better treatment than people of any other foreign state who make war upon an independent nation.Upon the firing on Sumter President Lincoln issued his first call for troops and soon after a proclamation convening Congress in extra session.The call was for 75,000 volunteers for ninety days' service.If the shot fired at Fort Sumter "was heard around the world," the call of the President for 75,000 men was heard throughout the Northern States.There was not a state in the North of a million of inhabitants that would not have furnished the entire number faster than arms could have been supplied to them, if it had been necessary.

As soon as the news of the call for volunteers reached Galena, posters were stuck up calling for a meeting of the citizens at the court-house in the evening.Business ceased entirely; all was excitement; for a time there were no party distinctions; all were Union men, determined to avenge the insult to the national flag.In the evening the court-house was packed.Although a comparative stranger I was called upon to preside; the sole reason, possibly, was that I had been in the army and had seen service.With much embarrassment and some prompting I made out to announce the object of the meeting.Speeches were in order, but it is doubtful whether it would have been safe just then to make other than patriotic ones.There was probably no one in the house, however, who felt like making any other.The two principal speeches were by B.B.Howard, the post-master and a Breckinridge Democrat at the November election the fall before, and John A.Rawlins, an elector on the Douglas ticket.E.B.Washburne, with whom I was not acquainted at that time, came in after the meeting had been organized, and expressed, I understood afterwards, a little surprise that Galena could not furnish a presiding officer for such an occasion without taking a stranger.He came forward and was introduced, and made a speech appealing to the patriotism of the meeting.

After the speaking was over volunteers were called for to form a company.The quota of Illinois had been fixed at six regiments; and it was supposed that one company would be as much as would be accepted from Galena.The company was raised and the officers and non-commissioned officers elected before the meeting adjourned.I declined the captaincy before the balloting, but announced that I would aid the company in every way I could and would be found in the service in some position if there should be a war.I never went into our leather store after that meeting, to put up a package or do other business.

The ladies of Galena were quite as patriotic as the men.They could not enlist, but they conceived the idea of sending their first company to the field uniformed.They came to me to get a description of the United States uniform for infantry; subscribed and bought the material; procured tailors to cut out the garments, and the ladies made them up.In a few days the company was in uniform and ready to report at the State capital for assignment.The men all turned out the morning after their enlistment, and I took charge, divided them into squads and superintended their drill.When they were ready to go to Springfield I went with them and remained there until they were assigned to a regiment.

There were so many more volunteers than had been called for that the question whom to accept was quite embarrassing to the governor, Richard Yates.The legislature was in session at the time, however, and came to his relief.A law was enacted authorizing the governor to accept the services of ten additional regiments, one from each congressional district, for one month, to be paid by the State, but pledged to go into the service of the United States if there should be a further call during their term.Even with this relief the governor was still very much embarrassed.Before the war was over he was like the President when he was taken with the varioloid: "at last he had something he could give to all who wanted it."

In time the Galena company was mustered into the United States service, forming a part of the 11th Illinois volunteer infantry.My duties, I thought, had ended at Springfield, and I was prepared to start home by the evening train, leaving at nine o'clock.Up to that time I do not think I had been introduced to Governor Yates, or had ever spoken to him.I knew him by sight, however, because he was living at the same hotel and I often saw him at table.The evening I was to quit the capital I left the supper room before the governor and was standing at the front door when he came out.He spoke to me, calling me by my old army title "Captain," and said he understood that I was about leaving the city.I answered that I was.He said he would be glad if I would remain over-night and call at the Executive office the next morning.I complied with his request, and was asked to go into the Adjutant-General's office and render such assistance as I could, the governor saying that my army experience would be of great service there.I accepted the proposition.

My old army experience I found indeed of very great service.I was no clerk, nor had I any capacity to become one.The only place I ever found in my life to put a paper so as to find it again was either a side coat-pocket or the hands of a clerk or secretary more careful than myself.But I had been quartermaster, commissary and adjutant in the field.The army forms were familiar to me and I could direct how they should be made out.There was a clerk in the office of the Adjutant-General who supplied my deficiencies.The ease with which the State of Illinois settled its accounts with the government at the close of the war is evidence of the efficiency of Mr. Loomis as an accountant on a large scale.He remained in the office until that time.

As I have stated, the legislature authorized the governor to accept the services of ten additional regiments.I had charge of mustering these regiments into the State service.They were assembled at the most convenient railroad centres in their respective congressional districts.I detailed officers to muster in a portion of them, but mustered three in the southern part of the State myself.One of these was to assemble at Belleville, some eighteen miles south-east of St.Louis.When I got there I found that only one or two companies had arrived.There was no probability of the regiment coming together under five days.This gave me a few idle days which I concluded to spend in St.Louis.

There was a considerable force of State militia at Camp Jackson, on the outskirts of St.Louis, at the time.There is but little doubt that it was the design of Governor Claiborn Jackson to have these troops ready to seize the United States arsenal and the city of St.Louis.Why they did not do so I do not know.There was but a small garrison, two companies I think, under Captain N.Lyon at the arsenal, and but for the timely services of the Hon.F.P.Blair, I have little doubt that St.Louis would have gone into rebel hands, and with it the arsenal with all its arms and ammunition.

Blair was a leader among the Union men of St.Louis in 1861.There was no State government in Missouri at the time that would sanction the raising of troops or commissioned officers to protect United States property, but Blair had probably procured some form of authority from the President to raise troops in Missouri and to muster them into the service of the United States.At all events, he did raise a regiment and took command himself as Colonel.With this force he reported to Captain Lyon and placed himself and regiment under his orders.It was whispered that Lyon thus reinforced intended to break up Camp Jackson and capture the militia.I went down to the arsenal in the morning to see the troops start out.I had known Lyon for two years at West Point and in the old army afterwards.Blair I knew very well by sight.I had heard him speak in the canvass of 1858, possibly several times, but I had never spoken to him.As the troops marched out of the enclosure around the arsenal, Blair was on his horse outside forming them into line preparatory to their march.I introduced myself to him and had a few moments' conversation and expressed my sympathy with his purpose.This was my first personal acquaintance with the Honorable—afterwards Major-General F.P.Blair.Camp Jackson surrendered without a fight and the garrison was marched down to the arsenal as prisoners of war.

Up to this time the enemies of the government in St.Louis had been bold and defiant, while Union men were quiet but determined.The enemies had their head-quarters in a central and public position on Pine Street, near Fifth—from which the rebel flag was flaunted boldly.The Union men had a place of meeting somewhere in the city, I did not know where, and I doubt whether they dared to enrage the enemies of the government by placing the national flag outside their head-quarters.As soon as the news of the capture of Camp Jackson reached the city the condition of affairs was changed.Union men became rampant, aggressive, and, if you will, intolerant.They proclaimed their sentiments boldly, and were impatient at anything like disrespect for the Union.The secessionists became quiet but were filled with suppressed rage.They had been playing the bully.The Union men ordered the rebel flag taken down from the building on Pine Street.The command was given in tones of authority and it was taken down, never to be raised again in St.Louis.

I witnessed the scene.I had heard of the surrender of the camp and that the garrison was on its way to the arsenal.I had seen the troops start out in the morning and had wished them success.I now determined to go to the arsenal and await their arrival and congratulate them.I stepped on a car standing at the corner of 4th and Pine streets, and saw a crowd of people standing quietly in front of the head-quarters, who were there for the purpose of hauling down the flag.There were squads of other people at intervals down the street.They too were quiet but filled with suppressed rage, and muttered their resentment at the insult to, what they called, "their" flag.Before the car I was in had started, a dapper little fellow—he would be called a dude at this day—stepped in.He was in a great state of excitement and used adjectives freely to express his contempt for the Union and for those who had just perpetrated such an outrage upon the rights of a free people.There was only one other passenger in the car besides myself when this young man entered.He evidently expected to find nothing but sympathy when he got away from the "mud sills" engaged in compelling a "free people" to pull down a flag they adored.He turned to me saying: "Things have come to a —— pretty pass when a free people can't choose their own flag.Where I came from if a man dares to say a word in favor of the Union we hang him to a limb of the first tree we come to."I replied that "after all we were not so intolerant in St.Louis as we might be; I had not seen a single rebel hung yet, nor heard of one; there were plenty of them who ought to be, however."The young man subsided.He was so crestfallen that I believe if I had ordered him to leave the car he would have gone quietly out, saying to himself: "More Yankee oppression."

By nightfall the late defenders of Camp Jackson were all within the walls of the St.Louis arsenal, prisoners of war.The next day I left St.Louis for Mattoon, Illinois, where I was to muster in the regiment from that congressional district.This was the 21st Illinois infantry, the regiment of which I subsequently became colonel.I mustered one regiment afterwards, when my services for the State were about closed.

Brigadier-General John Pope was stationed at Springfield, as United States mustering officer, all the time I was in the State service.He was a native of Illinois and well acquainted with most of the prominent men in the State.I was a carpet-bagger and knew but few of them.While I was on duty at Springfield the senators, representatives in Congress, ax-governors and the State legislators were nearly all at the State capital.The only acquaintance I made among them was with the governor, whom I was serving, and, by chance, with Senator S.A.Douglas.The only members of Congress I knew were Washburne and Philip Foulk.With the former, though he represented my district and we were citizens of the same town, I only became acquainted at the meeting when the first company of Galena volunteers was raised.Foulk I had known in St.Louis when I was a citizen of that city.I had been three years at West Point with Pope and had served with him a short time during the Mexican war, under General Taylor.I saw a good deal of him during my service with the State.On one occasion he said to me that I ought to go into the United States service.I told him I intended to do so if there was a war.He spoke of his acquaintance with the public men of the State, and said he could get them to recommend me for a position and that he would do all he could for me.I declined to receive endorsement for permission to fight for my country.

Going home for a day or two soon after this conversation with General Pope, I wrote from Galena the following letter to the Adjutant-General of the Army.

GALENA, ILLINOIS, May 24, 1861.

COL.L.THOMAS Adjt.Gen.U.S.A., Washington, D.C.

SIR:—Having served for fifteen years in the regular army, including four years at West Point, and feeling it the duty of every one who has been educated at the Government expense to offer their services for the support of that Government, I have the honor, very respectfully, to tender my services, until the close of the war, in such capacity as may be offered.I would say, in view of my present age and length of service, I feel myself competent to command a regiment, if the President, in his judgment, should see fit to intrust one to me.

Since the first call of the President I have been serving on the staff of the Governor of this State, rendering such aid as I could in the organization of our State militia, and am still engaged in that capacity.A letter addressed to me at Springfield, Illinois, will reach me.

I am very respectfully, Your obt.svt., U.S.GRANT.

This letter failed to elicit an answer from the Adjutant-General of the Army.I presume it was hardly read by him, and certainly it could not have been submitted to higher authority.Subsequent to the war General Badeau having heard of this letter applied to the War Department for a copy of it.The letter could not be found and no one recollected ever having seen it.I took no copy when it was written.Long after the application of General Badeau, General Townsend, who had become Adjutant-General of the Army, while packing up papers preparatory to the removal of his office, found this letter in some out-of-the-way place.It had not been destroyed, but it had not been regularly filed away.

I felt some hesitation in suggesting rank as high as the colonelcy of a regiment, feeling somewhat doubtful whether I would be equal to the position.But I had seen nearly every colonel who had been mustered in from the State of Illinois, and some from Indiana, and felt that if they could command a regiment properly, and with credit, I could also.

Having but little to do after the muster of the last of the regiments authorized by the State legislature, I asked and obtained of the governor leave of absence for a week to visit my parents in Covington, Kentucky, immediately opposite Cincinnati.General McClellan had been made a major-general and had his headquarters at Cincinnati.In reality I wanted to see him.I had known him slightly at West Point, where we served one year together, and in the Mexican war.I was in hopes that when he saw me he would offer me a position on his staff.I called on two successive days at his office but failed to see him on either occasion, and returned to Springfield.

CHAPTER XVIII.

APPOINTED COLONEL OF THE 21ST ILLINOIS—PERSONNEL OF THE REGIMENT—GENERAL LOGAN—MARCH TO MISSOURI—MOVEMENT AGAINST HARRIS AT FLORIDA, MO.—GENERAL POPE IN COMMAND—STATIONED AT MEXICO, MO.

While I was absent from the State capital on this occasion the President's second call for troops was issued.This time it was for 300,000 men, for three years or the war.This brought into the United States service all the regiments then in the State service.These had elected their officers from highest to lowest and were accepted with their organizations as they were, except in two instances.A Chicago regiment, the 19th infantry, had elected a very young man to the colonelcy.When it came to taking the field the regiment asked to have another appointed colonel and the one they had previously chosen made lieutenant-colonel.The 21st regiment of infantry, mustered in by me at Mattoon, refused to go into the service with the colonel of their selection in any position.While I was still absent Governor Yates appointed me colonel of this latter regiment.A few days after I was in charge of it and in camp on the fair grounds near Springfield.

My regiment was composed in large part of young men of as good social position as any in their section of the State.It embraced the sons of farmers, lawyers, physicians, politicians, merchants, bankers and ministers, and some men of maturer years who had filled such positions themselves.There were also men in it who could be led astray; and the colonel, elected by the votes of the regiment, had proved to be fully capable of developing all there was in his men of recklessness.It was said that he even went so far at times as to take the guard from their posts and go with them to the village near by and make a night of it.When there came a prospect of battle the regiment wanted to have some one else to lead them.I found it very hard work for a few days to bring all the men into anything like subordination; but the great majority favored discipline, and by the application of a little regular army punishment all were reduced to as good discipline as one could ask.

The ten regiments which had volunteered in the State service for thirty days, it will be remembered, had done so with a pledge to go into the National service if called upon within that time.When they volunteered the government had only called for ninety days' enlistments.Men were called now for three years or the war.They felt that this change of period released them from the obligation of re-volunteering.When I was appointed colonel, the 21st regiment was still in the State service.About the time they were to be mustered into the United States service, such of them as would go, two members of Congress from the State, McClernand and Logan, appeared at the capital and I was introduced to them.I had never seen either of them before, but I had read a great deal about them, and particularly about Logan, in the newspapers.Both were democratic members of Congress, and Logan had been elected from the southern district of the State, where he had a majority of eighteen thousand over his Republican competitor.His district had been settled originally by people from the Southern States, and at the breaking out of secession they sympathized with the South.At the first outbreak of war some of them joined the Southern army; many others were preparing to do so; others rode over the country at night denouncing the Union, and made it as necessary to guard railroad bridges over which National troops had to pass in southern Illinois, as it was in Kentucky or any of the border slave states.Logan's popularity in this district was unbounded.He knew almost enough of the people in it by their Christian names, to form an ordinary congressional district.As he went in politics, so his district was sure to go.The Republican papers had been demanding that he should announce where he stood on the questions which at that time engrossed the whole of public thought.Some were very bitter in their denunciations of his silence.Logan was not a man to be coerced into an utterance by threats.He did, however, come out in a speech before the adjournment of the special session of Congress which was convened by the President soon after his inauguration, and announced his undying loyalty and devotion to the Union.But I had not happened to see that speech, so that when I first met Logan my impressions were those formed from reading denunciations of him.McClernand, on the other hand, had early taken strong grounds for the maintenance of the Union and had been praised accordingly by the Republican papers.The gentlemen who presented these two members of Congress asked me if I would have any objections to their addressing my regiment.I hesitated a little before answering.It was but a few days before the time set for mustering into the United States service such of the men as were willing to volunteer for three years or the war.I had some doubt as to the effect a speech from Logan might have; but as he was with McClernand, whose sentiments on the all-absorbing questions of the day were well known, I gave my consent.McClernand spoke first; and Logan followed in a speech which he has hardly equalled since for force and eloquence.It breathed a loyalty and devotion to the Union which inspired my men to such a point that they would have volunteered to remain in the army as long as an enemy of the country continued to bear arms against it.They entered the United States service almost to a man.

General Logan went to his part of the State and gave his attention to raising troops.The very men who at first made it necessary to guard the roads in southern Illinois became the defenders of the Union.Logan entered the service himself as colonel of a regiment and rapidly rose to the rank of major-general.His district, which had promised at first to give much trouble to the government, filled every call made upon it for troops, without resorting to the draft.There was no call made when there were not more volunteers than were asked for.That congressional district stands credited at the War Department to-day with furnishing more men for the army than it was called on to supply.

I remained in Springfield with my regiment until the 3d of July, when I was ordered to Quincy, Illinois.By that time the regiment was in a good state of discipline and the officers and men were well up in the company drill.There was direct railroad communication between Springfield and Quincy, but I thought it would be good preparation for the troops to march there.We had no transportation for our camp and garrison equipage, so wagons were hired for the occasion and on the 3d of July we started.There was no hurry, but fair marches were made every day until the Illinois River was crossed.There I was overtaken by a dispatch saying that the destination of the regiment had been changed to Ironton, Missouri, and ordering me to halt where I was and await the arrival of a steamer which had been dispatched up the Illinois River to take the regiment to St.Louis.The boat, when it did come, grounded on a sand-bar a few miles below where we were in camp.We remained there several days waiting to have the boat get off the bar, but before this occurred news came that an Illinois regiment was surrounded by rebels at a point on the Hannibal and St.Joe Railroad some miles west of Palmyra, in Missouri, and I was ordered to proceed with all dispatch to their relief.We took the cars and reached Quincy in a few hours.

When I left Galena for the last time to take command of the 21st regiment I took with me my oldest son, Frederick D.Grant, then a lad of eleven years of age.On receiving the order to take rail for Quincy I wrote to Mrs. Grant, to relieve what I supposed would be her great anxiety for one so young going into danger, that I would send Fred home from Quincy by river.I received a prompt letter in reply decidedly disapproving my proposition, and urging that the lad should be allowed to accompany me.It came too late.Fred was already on his way up the Mississippi bound for Dubuque, Iowa, from which place there was a railroad to Galena.

My sensations as we approached what I supposed might be "a field of battle" were anything but agreeable.I had been in all the engagements in Mexico that it was possible for one person to be in; but not in command.If some one else had been colonel and I had been lieutenant-colonel I do not think I would have felt any trepidation.Before we were prepared to cross the Mississippi River at Quincy my anxiety was relieved; for the men of the besieged regiment came straggling into town.I am inclined to think both sides got frightened and ran away.

I took my regiment to Palmyra and remained there for a few days, until relieved by the 19th Illinois infantry.From Palmyra I proceeded to Salt River, the railroad bridge over which had been destroyed by the enemy.Colonel John M.Palmer at that time commanded the 13th Illinois, which was acting as a guard to workmen who were engaged in rebuilding this bridge.Palmer was my senior and commanded the two regiments as long as we remained together.The bridge was finished in about two weeks, and I received orders to move against Colonel Thomas Harris, who was said to be encamped at the little town of Florida, some twenty-five miles south of where we then were.

At the time of which I now write we had no transportation and the country about Salt River was sparsely settled, so that it took some days to collect teams and drivers enough to move the camp and garrison equipage of a regiment nearly a thousand strong, together with a week's supply of provision and some ammunition.While preparations for the move were going on I felt quite comfortable; but when we got on the road and found every house deserted I was anything but easy.In the twenty-five miles we had to march we did not see a person, old or young, male or female, except two horsemen who were on a road that crossed ours.As soon as they saw us they decamped as fast as their horses could carry them.I kept my men in the ranks and forbade their entering any of the deserted houses or taking anything from them.We halted at night on the road and proceeded the next morning at an early hour.Harris had been encamped in a creek bottom for the sake of being near water.The hills on either side of the creek extend to a considerable height, possibly more than a hundred feet.As we approached the brow of the hill from which it was expected we could see Harris' camp, and possibly find his men ready formed to meet us, my heart kept getting higher and higher until it felt to me as though it was in my throat.I would have given anything then to have been back in Illinois, but I had not the moral courage to halt and consider what to do; I kept right on.When we reached a point from which the valley below was in full view I halted.The place where Harris had been encamped a few days before was still there and the marks of a recent encampment were plainly visible, but the troops were gone.My heart resumed its place.It occurred to me at once that Harris had been as much afraid of me as I had been of him.This was a view of the question I had never taken before; but it was one I never forgot afterwards.From that event to the close of the war, I never experienced trepidation upon confronting an enemy, though I always felt more or less anxiety.I never forgot that he had as much reason to fear my forces as I had his.The lesson was valuable.

Inquiries at the village of Florida divulged the fact that Colonel Harris, learning of my intended movement, while my transportation was being collected took time by the forelock and left Florida before I had started from Salt River.He had increased the distance between us by forty miles.The next day I started back to my old camp at Salt River bridge.The citizens living on the line of our march had returned to their houses after we passed, and finding everything in good order, nothing carried away, they were at their front doors ready to greet us now.They had evidently been led to believe that the National troops carried death and devastation with them wherever they went.

In a short time after our return to Salt River bridge I was ordered with my regiment to the town of Mexico.General Pope was then commanding the district embracing all of the State of Missouri between the Mississippi and Missouri rivers, with his headquarters in the village of Mexico.I was assigned to the command of a sub-district embracing the troops in the immediate neighborhood, some three regiments of infantry and a section of artillery.There was one regiment encamped by the side of mine.I assumed command of the whole and the first night sent the commander of the other regiment the parole and countersign.Not wishing to be outdone in courtesy, he immediately sent me the countersign for his regiment for the night.When he was informed that the countersign sent to him was for use with his regiment as well as mine, it was difficult to make him understand that this was not an unwarranted interference of one colonel over another.No doubt he attributed it for the time to the presumption of a graduate of West Point over a volunteer pure and simple.But the question was soon settled and we had no further trouble.

My arrival in Mexico had been preceded by that of two or three regiments in which proper discipline had not been maintained, and the men had been in the habit of visiting houses without invitation and helping themselves to food and drink, or demanding them from the occupants.They carried their muskets while out of camp and made every man they found take the oath of allegiance to the government.I at once published orders prohibiting the soldiers from going into private houses unless invited by the inhabitants, and from appropriating private property to their own or to government uses.The people were no longer molested or made afraid.I received the most marked courtesy from the citizens of Mexico as long as I remained there.

Up to this time my regiment had not been carried in the school of the soldier beyond the company drill, except that it had received some training on the march from Springfield to the Illinois River.There was now a good opportunity of exercising it in the battalion drill.While I was at West Point the tactics used in the army had been Scott's and the musket the flint lock.I had never looked at a copy of tactics from the time of my graduation.My standing in that branch of studies had been near the foot of the class.In the Mexican war in the summer of 1846, I had been appointed regimental quartermaster and commissary and had not been at a battalion drill since.The arms had been changed since then and Hardee's tactics had been adopted.I got a copy of tactics and studied one lesson, intending to confine the exercise of the first day to the commands I had thus learned.By pursuing this course from day to day I thought I would soon get through the volume.

We were encamped just outside of town on the common, among scattering suburban houses with enclosed gardens, and when I got my regiment in line and rode to the front I soon saw that if I attempted to follow the lesson I had studied I would have to clear away some of the houses and garden fences to make room.I perceived at once, however, that Hardee's tactics—a mere translation from the French with Hardee's name attached—was nothing more than common sense and the progress of the age applied to Scott's system.The commands were abbreviated and the movement expedited.Under the old tactics almost every change in the order of march was preceded by a "halt," then came the change, and then the "forward march."With the new tactics all these changes could be made while in motion.I found no trouble in giving commands that would take my regiment where I wanted it to go and carry it around all obstacles.I do not believe that the officers of the regiment ever discovered that I had never studied the tactics that I used.

CHAPTER XIX.

COMMISSIONED BRIGADIER-GENERAL—COMMAND AT IRONTON, MO.—JEFFERSON CITY—CAPE GIRARDEAU—GENERAL PRENTISS—SEIZURE OF PADUCAH—HEADQUARTERS AT CAIRO.

I had not been in Mexico many weeks when, reading a St.Louis paper, I found the President had asked the Illinois delegation in Congress to recommend some citizens of the State for the position of brigadier-general, and that they had unanimously recommended me as first on a list of seven.I was very much surprised because, as I have said, my acquaintance with the Congressmen was very limited and I did not know of anything I had done to inspire such confidence.The papers of the next day announced that my name, with three others, had been sent to the Senate, and a few days after our confirmation was announced.

When appointed brigadier-general I at once thought it proper that one of my aides should come from the regiment I had been commanding, and so selected Lieutenant C.B.Lagow.While living in St.Louis, I had had a desk in the law office of McClellan, Moody and Hillyer.Difference in views between the members of the firm on the questions of the day, and general hard times in the border cities, had broken up this firm.Hillyer was quite a young man, then in his twenties, and very brilliant.I asked him to accept a place on my staff.I also wanted to take one man from my new home, Galena.The canvass in the Presidential campaign the fall before had brought out a young lawyer by the name of John A.Rawlins, who proved himself one of the ablest speakers in the State.He was also a candidate for elector on the Douglas ticket.When Sumter was fired upon and the integrity of the Union threatened, there was no man more ready to serve his country than he.I wrote at once asking him to accept the position of assistant adjutant-general with the rank of captain, on my staff.He was about entering the service as major of a new regiment then organizing in the north-western part of the State; but he threw this up and accepted my offer.

Neither Hillyer nor Lagow proved to have any particular taste or special qualifications for the duties of the soldier, and the former resigned during the Vicksburg campaign; the latter I relieved after the battle of Chattanooga.Rawlins remained with me as long as he lived, and rose to the rank of brigadier general and chief-of-staff to the General of the Army—an office created for him—before the war closed.He was an able man, possessed of great firmness, and could say "no" so emphatically to a request which he thought should not be granted that the person he was addressing would understand at once that there was no use of pressing the matter.General Rawlins was a very useful officer in other ways than this.I became very much attached to him.

Shortly after my promotion I was ordered to Ironton, Missouri, to command a district in that part of the State, and took the 21st Illinois, my old regiment, with me.Several other regiments were ordered to the same destination about the same time.Ironton is on the Iron Mountain railroad, about seventy miles south of St.Louis, and situated among hills rising almost to the dignity of mountains.When I reached there, about the 8th of August, Colonel B.Gratz Brown—afterwards Governor of Missouri and in 1872 Vice-Presidential candidate—was in command.Some of his troops were ninety days' men and their time had expired some time before.The men had no clothing but what they had volunteered in, and much of this was so worn that it would hardly stay on.General Hardee—the author of the tactics I did not study—was at Greenville some twenty-five miles further south, it was said, with five thousand Confederate troops.Under these circumstances Colonel Brown's command was very much demoralized.A squadron of cavalry could have ridden into the valley and captured the entire force.Brown himself was gladder to see me on that occasion than he ever has been since.I relieved him and sent all his men home within a day or two, to be mustered out of service.

Within ten days after reaching Ironton I was prepared to take the offensive against the enemy at Greenville.I sent a column east out of the valley we were in, with orders to swing around to the south and west and come into the Greenville road ten miles south of Ironton.Another column marched on the direct road and went into camp at the point designated for the two columns to meet.I was to ride out the next morning and take personal command of the movement.My experience against Harris, in northern Missouri, had inspired me with confidence.But when the evening train came in, it brought General B.M.Prentiss with orders to take command of the district.His orders did not relieve me, but I knew that by law I was senior, and at that time even the President did not have the authority to assign a junior to command a senior of the same grade.I therefore gave General Prentiss the situation of the troops and the general condition of affairs, and started for St.Louis the same day.The movement against the rebels at Greenville went no further.

From St.Louis I was ordered to Jefferson City, the capital of the State, to take command.General Sterling Price, of the Confederate army, was thought to be threatening the capital, Lexington, Chillicothe and other comparatively large towns in the central part of Missouri.I found a good many troops in Jefferson City, but in the greatest confusion, and no one person knew where they all were.Colonel Mulligan, a gallant man, was in command, but he had not been educated as yet to his new profession and did not know how to maintain discipline.I found that volunteers had obtained permission from the department commander, or claimed they had, to raise, some of them, regiments; some battalions; some companies—the officers to be commissioned according to the number of men they brought into the service.There were recruiting stations all over town, with notices, rudely lettered on boards over the doors, announcing the arm of service and length of time for which recruits at that station would be received.The law required all volunteers to serve for three years or the war.But in Jefferson City in August, 1861, they were recruited for different periods and on different conditions; some were enlisted for six months, some for a year, some without any condition as to where they were to serve, others were not to be sent out of the State.The recruits were principally men from regiments stationed there and already in the service, bound for three years if the war lasted that long.

The city was filled with Union fugitives who had been driven by guerilla bands to take refuge with the National troops.They were in a deplorable condition and must have starved but for the support the government gave them.They had generally made their escape with a team or two, sometimes a yoke of oxen with a mule or a horse in the lead.A little bedding besides their clothing and some food had been thrown into the wagon.All else of their worldly goods were abandoned and appropriated by their former neighbors; for the Union man in Missouri who staid at home during the rebellion, if he was not immediately under the protection of the National troops, was at perpetual war with his neighbors.I stopped the recruiting service, and disposed the troops about the outskirts of the city so as to guard all approaches.Order was soon restored.

I had been at Jefferson City but a few days when I was directed from department headquarters to fit out an expedition to Lexington, Booneville and Chillicothe, in order to take from the banks in those cities all the funds they had and send them to St.Louis.The western army had not yet been supplied with transportation.It became necessary therefore to press into the service teams belonging to sympathizers with the rebellion or to hire those of Union men.This afforded an opportunity of giving employment to such of the refugees within our lines as had teams suitable for our purposes.They accepted the service with alacrity.As fast as troops could be got off they were moved west some twenty miles or more.In seven or eight days from my assuming command at Jefferson City, I had all the troops, except a small garrison, at an advanced position and expected to join them myself the next day.

But my campaigns had not yet begun, for while seated at my office door, with nothing further to do until it was time to start for the front, I saw an officer of rank approaching, who proved to be Colonel Jefferson C.Davis.I had never met him before, but he introduced himself by handing me an order for him to proceed to Jefferson City and relieve me of the command.The orders directed that I should report at department headquarters at St.Louis without delay, to receive important special instructions.It was about an hour before the only regular train of the day would start.I therefore turned over to Colonel Davis my orders, and hurriedly stated to him the progress that had been made to carry out the department instructions already described.I had at that time but one staff officer, doing myself all the detail work usually performed by an adjutant-general.In an hour after being relieved from the command I was on my way to St.Louis, leaving my single staff officer [C.B.Lagow, the others not yet having joined me.]to follow the next day with our horses and baggage.

The "important special instructions" which I received the next day, assigned me to the command of the district of south-east Missouri, embracing all the territory south of St.Louis, in Missouri, as well as all southern Illinois.At first I was to take personal command of a combined expedition that had been ordered for the capture of Colonel Jeff.Thompson, a sort of independent or partisan commander who was disputing with us the possession of south-east Missouri.Troops had been ordered to move from Ironton to Cape Girardeau, sixty or seventy miles to the south-east, on the Mississippi River; while the forces at Cape Girardeau had been ordered to move to Jacksonville, ten miles out towards Ironton; and troops at Cairo and Bird's Point, at the junction of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, were to hold themselves in readiness to go down the Mississippi to Belmont, eighteen miles below, to be moved west from there when an officer should come to command them.I was the officer who had been selected for this purpose.Cairo was to become my headquarters when the expedition terminated.

In pursuance of my orders I established my temporary headquarters at Cape Girardeau and sent instructions to the commanding officer at Jackson, to inform me of the approach of General Prentiss from Ironton.Hired wagons were kept moving night and day to take additional rations to Jackson, to supply the troops when they started from there.Neither General Prentiss nor Colonel Marsh, who commanded at Jackson, knew their destination.I drew up all the instructions for the contemplated move, and kept them in my pocket until I should hear of the junction of our troops at Jackson.Two or three days after my arrival at Cape Girardeau, word came that General Prentiss was approaching that place (Jackson).I started at once to meet him there and to give him his orders.As I turned the first corner of a street after starting, I saw a column of cavalry passing the next street in front of me.I turned and rode around the block the other way, so as to meet the head of the column.I found there General Prentiss himself, with a large escort.He had halted his troops at Jackson for the night, and had come on himself to Cape Girardeau, leaving orders for his command to follow him in the morning.I gave the General his orders—which stopped him at Jackson—but he was very much aggrieved at being placed under another brigadier-general, particularly as he believed himself to be the senior.He had been a brigadier, in command at Cairo, while I was mustering officer at Springfield without any rank.But we were nominated at the same time for the United States service, and both our commissions bore date May 17th, 1861.By virtue of my former army rank I was, by law, the senior.General Prentiss failed to get orders to his troops to remain at Jackson, and the next morning early they were reported as approaching Cape Girardeau.I then ordered the General very peremptorily to countermarch his command and take it back to Jackson.He obeyed the order, but bade his command adieu when he got them to Jackson, and went to St.Louis and reported himself.This broke up the expedition.But little harm was done, as Jeff.Thompson moved light and had no fixed place for even nominal headquarters.He was as much at home in Arkansas as he was in Missouri and would keep out of the way of a superior force.Prentiss was sent to another part of the State.

General Prentiss made a great mistake on the above occasion, one that he would not have committed later in the war.When I came to know him better, I regretted it much.In consequence of this occurrence he was off duty in the field when the principal campaign at the West was going on, and his juniors received promotion while he was where none could be obtained.He would have been next to myself in rank in the district of south-east Missouri, by virtue of his services in the Mexican war.He was a brave and very earnest soldier.No man in the service was more sincere in his devotion to the cause for which we were battling; none more ready to make sacrifices or risk life in it.

On the 4th of September I removed my headquarters to Cairo and found Colonel Richard Oglesby in command of the post.We had never met, at least not to my knowledge.After my promotion I had ordered my brigadier-general's uniform from New York, but it had not yet arrived, so that I was in citizen's dress.The Colonel had his office full of people, mostly from the neighboring States of Missouri and Kentucky, making complaints or asking favors.He evidently did not catch my name when I was presented, for on my taking a piece of paper from the table where he was seated and writing the order assuming command of the district of south-east Missouri, Colonel Richard J.Oglesby to command the post at Bird's Point, and handing it to him, he put on an expression of surprise that looked a little as if he would like to have some one identify me.But he surrendered the office without question.

The day after I assumed command at Cairo a man came to me who said he was a scout of General Fremont.He reported that he had just come from Columbus, a point on the Mississippi twenty miles below on the Kentucky side, and that troops had started from there, or were about to start, to seize Paducah, at the mouth of the Tennessee.There was no time for delay; I reported by telegraph to the department commander the information I had received, and added that I was taking steps to get off that night to be in advance of the enemy in securing that important point.There was a large number of steamers lying at Cairo and a good many boatmen were staying in the town.It was the work of only a few hours to get the boats manned, with coal aboard and steam up.Troops were also designated to go aboard.The distance from Cairo to Paducah is about forty-five miles.I did not wish to get there before daylight of the 6th, and directed therefore that the boats should lie at anchor out in the stream until the time to start.Not having received an answer to my first dispatch, I again telegraphed to department headquarters that I should start for Paducah that night unless I received further orders.Hearing nothing, we started before midnight and arrived early the following morning, anticipating the enemy by probably not over six or eight hours.It proved very fortunate that the expedition against Jeff.Thompson had been broken up.Had it not been, the enemy would have seized Paducah and fortified it, to our very great annoyance.

When the National troops entered the town the citizens were taken by surprise.I never after saw such consternation depicted on the faces of the people.Men, women and children came out of their doors looking pale and frightened at the presence of the invader.They were expecting rebel troops that day.In fact, nearly four thousand men from Columbus were at that time within ten or fifteen miles of Paducah on their way to occupy the place.I had but two regiments and one battery with me, but the enemy did not know this and returned to Columbus.I stationed my troops at the best points to guard the roads leading into the city, left gunboats to guard the river fronts and by noon was ready to start on my return to Cairo.Before leaving, however, I addressed a short printed proclamation to the citizens of Paducah assuring them of our peaceful intentions, that we had come among them to protect them against the enemies of our country, and that all who chose could continue their usual avocations with assurance of the protection of the government.This was evidently a relief to them; but the majority would have much preferred the presence of the other army.I reinforced Paducah rapidly from the troops at Cape Girardeau; and a day or two later General C.F.Smith, a most accomplished soldier, reported at Cairo and was assigned to the command of the post at the mouth of the Tennessee.In a short time it was well fortified and a detachment was sent to occupy Smithland, at the mouth of the Cumberland.

The State government of Kentucky at that time was rebel in sentiment, but wanted to preserve an armed neutrality between the North and the South, and the governor really seemed to think the State had a perfect right to maintain a neutral position.The rebels already occupied two towns in the State, Columbus and Hickman, on the Mississippi; and at the very moment the National troops were entering Paducah from the Ohio front, General Lloyd Tilghman—a Confederate—with his staff and a small detachment of men, were getting out in the other direction, while, as I have already said, nearly four thousand Confederate troops were on Kentucky soil on their way to take possession of the town.But, in the estimation of the governor and of those who thought with him, this did not justify the National authorities in invading the soil of Kentucky.I informed the legislature of the State of what I was doing, and my action was approved by the majority of that body.On my return to Cairo I found authority from department headquarters for me to take Paducah "if I felt strong enough," but very soon after I was reprimanded from the same quarters for my correspondence with the legislature and warned against a repetition of the offence.

Soon after I took command at Cairo, General Fremont entered into arrangements for the exchange of the prisoners captured at Camp Jackson in the month of May.I received orders to pass them through my lines to Columbus as they presented themselves with proper credentials.Quite a number of these prisoners I had been personally acquainted with before the war.Such of them as I had so known were received at my headquarters as old acquaintances, and ordinary routine business was not disturbed by their presence.On one occasion when several were present in my office my intention to visit Cape Girardeau the next day, to inspect the troops at that point, was mentioned.Something transpired which postponed my trip; but a steamer employed by the government was passing a point some twenty or more miles above Cairo, the next day, when a section of rebel artillery with proper escort brought her to.A major, one of those who had been at my headquarters the day before, came at once aboard and after some search made a direct demand for my delivery.It was hard to persuade him that I was not there.This officer was Major Barrett, of St.Louis.I had been acquainted with his family before the war.

CHAPTER XX.

GENERAL FREMONT IN COMMAND—MOVEMENT AGAINST BELMONT—BATTLE OF BELMONT—A NARROW ESCAPE—AFTER THE BATTLE.

From the occupation of Paducah up to the early part of November nothing important occurred with the troops under my command.I was reinforced from time to time and the men were drilled and disciplined preparatory for the service which was sure to come.By the 1st of November I had not fewer than 20,000 men, most of them under good drill and ready to meet any equal body of men who, like themselves, had not yet been in an engagement.They were growing impatient at lying idle so long, almost in hearing of the guns of the enemy they had volunteered to fight against.I asked on one or two occasions to be allowed to move against Columbus.It could have been taken soon after the occupation of Paducah; but before November it was so strongly fortified that it would have required a large force and a long siege to capture it.

In the latter part of October General Fremont took the field in person and moved from Jefferson City against General Sterling Price, who was then in the State of Missouri with a considerable command.About the first of November I was directed from department headquarters to make a demonstration on both sides of the Mississippi River with the view of detaining the rebels at Columbus within their lines.Before my troops could be got off, I was notified from the same quarter that there were some 3,000 of the enemy on the St.Francis River about fifty miles west, or south-west, from Cairo, and was ordered to send another force against them.I dispatched Colonel Oglesby at once with troops sufficient to compete with the reported number of the enemy.On the 5th word came from the same source that the rebels were about to detach a large force from Columbus to be moved by boats down the Mississippi and up the White River, in Arkansas, in order to reinforce Price, and I was directed to prevent this movement if possible.I accordingly sent a regiment from Bird's Point under Colonel W.H.L.Wallace to overtake and reinforce Oglesby, with orders to march to New Madrid, a point some distance below Columbus, on the Missouri side.At the same time I directed General C.F.Smith to move all the troops he could spare from Paducah directly against Columbus, halting them, however, a few miles from the town to await further orders from me.Then I gathered up all the troops at Cairo and Fort Holt, except suitable guards, and moved them down the river on steamers convoyed by two gunboats, accompanying them myself.My force consisted of a little over 3,000 men and embraced five regiments of infantry, two guns and two companies of cavalry.We dropped down the river on the 6th to within about six miles of Columbus, debarked a few men on the Kentucky side and established pickets to connect with the troops from Paducah.

I had no orders which contemplated an attack by the National troops, nor did I intend anything of the kind when I started out from Cairo; but after we started I saw that the officers and men were elated at the prospect of at last having the opportunity of doing what they had volunteered to do—fight the enemies of their country.I did not see how I could maintain discipline, or retain the confidence of my command, if we should return to Cairo without an effort to do something.Columbus, besides being strongly fortified, contained a garrison much more numerous than the force I had with me.It would not do, therefore, to attack that point.About two o'clock on the morning of the 7th, I learned that the enemy was crossing troops from Columbus to the west bank to be dispatched, presumably, after Oglesby.I knew there was a small camp of Confederates at Belmont, immediately opposite Columbus, and I speedily resolved to push down the river, land on the Missouri side, capture Belmont, break up the camp and return.Accordingly, the pickets above Columbus were drawn in at once, and about daylight the boats moved out from shore.In an hour we were debarking on the west bank of the Mississippi, just out of range of the batteries at Columbus.

The ground on the west shore of the river, opposite Columbus, is low and in places marshy and cut up with sloughs.The soil is rich and the timber large and heavy.There were some small clearings between Belmont and the point where we landed, but most of the country was covered with the native forests.We landed in front of a cornfield.When the debarkation commenced, I took a regiment down the river to post it as a guard against surprise.At that time I had no staff officer who could be trusted with that duty.In the woods, at a short distance below the clearing, I found a depression, dry at the time, but which at high water became a slough or bayou.I placed the men in the hollow, gave them their instructions and ordered them to remain there until they were properly relieved.These troops, with the gunboats, were to protect our transports.

Up to this time the enemy had evidently failed to divine our intentions.From Columbus they could, of course, see our gunboats and transports loaded with troops.But the force from Paducah was threatening them from the land side, and it was hardly to be expected that if Columbus was our object we would separate our troops by a wide river.They doubtless thought we meant to draw a large force from the east bank, then embark ourselves, land on the east bank and make a sudden assault on Columbus before their divided command could be united.

About eight o'clock we started from the point of debarkation, marching by the flank.After moving in this way for a mile or a mile and a half, I halted where there was marshy ground covered with a heavy growth of timber in our front, and deployed a large part of my force as skirmishers.By this time the enemy discovered that we were moving upon Belmont and sent out troops to meet us.Soon after we had started in line, his skirmishers were encountered and fighting commenced.This continued, growing fiercer and fiercer, for about four hours, the enemy being forced back gradually until he was driven into his camp.Early in this engagement my horse was shot under me, but I got another from one of my staff and kept well up with the advance until the river was reached.

The officers and men engaged at Belmont were then under fire for the first time. Veterans could not have behaved better than they did up to the moment of reaching the rebel camp. At this point they became demoralized from their victory and failed to reap its full reward. The enemy had been followed so closely that when he reached the clear ground on which his camp was pitched he beat a hasty retreat over the river bank, which protected him from our shots and from view. This precipitate retreat at the last moment enabled the National forces to pick their way without hinderance through the abatis—the only artificial defence the enemy had.The moment the camp was reached our men laid down their arms and commenced rummaging the tents to pick up trophies.Some of the higher officers were little better than the privates.They galloped about from one cluster of men to another and at every halt delivered a short eulogy upon the Union cause and the achievements of the command.