Soldiers of Conquest

by F. M. Parker

  Lee’s main concern was that Scott hadn’t required Santa-Anna to surrender Chapultepec Hill before the armistice went into effect. It possessed a strong defense and would be a difficult fortification to take. Still Scott was an honorable man and had done what he thought was best under the circumstances.

  Hitchcock rose to his feet and his voice cut through the din of complaints. “Our commander has made a decision to allow time for Mr. Trist to try to negotiate a treaty that would stop further fighting. We must uphold him in this. Further, we as officers must be careful about what we say in front of our men.” Every officer in the cantina listened to Hitchcock for he was a full colonel, the Army Inspector General, and Scott’s chief of Staff.

  Smith recognized he was being reprimanded. “I accept that colonel. If we can bring proof that Santa-Anna has broken the truce, can we present it to the general?”

  “Certainly. In fact I will help you present it.” Hitchcock reseated himself.

  Grant knew Hitchcock had shut off the grumbling for now. He pointed at the American Star on the table in front of Hazlitt. “Okay if I have a look at that?”

  “Sure. It’s hot off the press.”

  Grant thought there was a sorrowful cast to Hazlitt’s eyes. He was probably wrong. He began to scan the paper and came to promotions. The list was substantial for Scott rewarded those who served bravely and wisely. Among the names on the list were two of Grant’s classmates at West Point, Buckner and Granger that had been promoted to captain. The twenty-year-old McClellan had been promoted to full lieutenant. Lee had been made permanent major and recommended for lieutenant colonel. Garland had been recommended for brigadier general, and Hazlitt for captain. Hooker, Longstreet, and Pickett were recommended for promotion. Grant’s name was missing.

  Grant placed the paper back on the table. He picked up his whiskey and drank it down.

  *

  The third day of September was winding down to evening when Nicholas Trist returned from the city after a day of negotiations with the commissioners of the Mexican Government. Dispirited and fatigued he entered Scott’s headquarters in Tacubaya where the general was discussing the army’s supply of ammunition with Lee, Worth, Hitchcock, and Captain Huger, Chief of Ordnance. Trist had the privilege of coming directly to Scott’s office without being announced by an orderly. Scott immediately bade him to have a seat.

  “You have news,” Scott said and looking into Trist’s disturbed face.

  “Yes, general.”

  Worth and the junior officers started to rise. Scott quickly motioned for them to remain seated. “Stay, gentlemen, for you should hear this first hand.”

  Scott spoke to Trist. “Your news of course has to do with the ultimatum you gave the Mexicans yesterday?”

  Trsit nodded sorrowfully. “We can’t agree on terms and so I’ve suspended the talks. They are willingly to give up Texas and upper California for they are distant from their capital and we’ve already taken them. They won’t surrender New Mexico and President Polk has given me specific instruction that we must have it.”

  “What reaction do they have to the money that’s being offered?”

  “It doesn’t seem to be of much interest to them. It’s the loss of territory and its Mexican population that makes them unwilling to come to terms. There’s another important reason the government officials won’t agree to the terms we want. Some of the outlying provinces threaten to secede if peace overtures are accepted. The governor of Queretaro State has stated that any sale of territory would mean a general secession, and that he will certainly take his state out of the nation if a treaty is made with us. General, I fear further talks are useless.”

  “I had hoped to avoid assaulting their capital, but I have no alternative. I shall send a notice to Santa-Anna that the truce has ended due to his having violated the truce by strengthening his fortifications. General Worth, you shall have the lead in the coming action so prepare your men and weapons.

  “Yes, sir,” Worth said with a strictly military tone.

  Lee had thought Worth might have shown some gratitude for Scott had just given him a prize by allowing his division to make the main assault. Yet there had been none. The hard feelings between Worth and Scott since Puebla hadn’t eased one bit.

  Scott turned to Lee. “Major, you and your engineers reconnoiter the roads leading into the city and their defenses and make reports on their use as avenues for the attack on the city.”

  CHAPTER 38

  September 8, 1847. From Worth’s command post on a rise of land behind the American lines, Lee watched the dawn unfurl its pale gray glow across the cloudless sky. The land took shape, the black night shadows in the valley bottom shrinking and dying. He lifted his field glasses to examine Molino del Rey, The King’s Mill, which was becoming visible in the growing light some one thousand yards distant.

  The Molino was a combination of a flourmill and a foundry for casting bronze cannon. He had examined its white walls many times during the past few days. It was a long stone building with a few smaller ones also made of stone, and all extending in a nearly straight line north to south. The narrow passageways between the buildings were strongly barricaded with sandbags. The heavy walls and the sandbag reinforced two feet high stone parapets on the flat roofs made the buildings fort-like. To the left of the Molino about three hundred yards and anchoring its right flank was Casa Mata, a squat stone citadel used by the Mexicans as a powder magazine. More than a score cannons had been placed in redoubts in the earthworks surrounding the structure. Lee had seen a regiment of soldiers guarding it. The Mexicans were in a very strong positions. The cannon on Chapultepec Hill could cover the eastern segment of the battlefield, the guns of Casa Mata the western section. The Molino made a continuous breastwork covering the entire front. The line in total was nearly a mile long and he could see no weak point.

  Behind the Molino was a large grove of cypress trees extending to the base of Chapultepec Hill, Grasshopper Hill, a two-hundred-foot high volcanic hill rising abruptly from the plain to loom over the main road leading into Mexico City. Chapultepec Castle, a massive masonry structure of two stories capped the hill. The Castle had been the resort of long dead Aztec princes and later used by the Viceroys of Spain.

  Worth and Lee had drawn up an assault plan that Scott had approved. El Molino would be bombarded by cannon fire and then the infantry would rush in and mop up the defenders that hadn’t been killed or fled. Though El Molino would be a tough fortification for infantrymen to take, its stone walls could be easily demolished by American siege cannon. Once El Molino had been taken, Worth would turn his men loose on Casa Mata.

  Lee shifted his glasses to study the arrangement of the Americans assembled to assault the Molino. Lee didn’t believe the assault was the correct thing to do. He and several other senior officers after intensive examination of the Molino had recommended to Scott that it be by-passed for it didn’t threaten access to the city. It could prove to be a distraction and cost men’s lives. Scott had rebutted them by saying he had information that he believed accurate that church bells were being brought from the city to the Molino where they were being melted down and made into cannon for the defense of the capital. Therefore the Molino had to be taken. Lee and the others had then argued that the news could be a rumor that Santa-Anna had spread, and further that any cannons made there after today would be too late to help the Mexicans since the Americans were ready to move upon the city. Scott could not be swayed to change his mind, saying that it would be but a minor effort to capture the Molino.

  Lee focused his glasses on Garland’s infantry waiting some three hundred yards directly south of the Molino, and just behind Captain Drum of the Fourth Artillery standing ready with four 6-pounders to fire upon the Molino and to ward off any flank attack from Chapultepec. On the ridge a little farther left was Major Huger with two 24-pound siege guns that would do the heavy work. Next on the left was Major Wright with five hundred volunteers drawn from Worth’s six infantr
y regiments. Close on Wright’s left was Kirby Smith’s battalion waiting to support the five hundred. Farther left was Colonel Duncan with his wheeled artillery. Next left was Clarke’s brigade of infantry facing the west end of the Molino and threatening the Casa Mata. Finally on the far left was Major Sumner with 270 Dragoons. His task was to hold off any Mexican cavalry that might try to enter the fray.

  *

  In the gray darkness, Grant sat on the hard surface of the road and marked time with the infantry of Garland’s brigade. He had awaken at 3 o’clock, ate a little cold food Valere had prepared the evening before, and marched with the men from Tacubaya to participate in the battle to take the Molino. He waited silently with his thoughts turned inward to Julia and his family, mostly to Julia.

  Yesterday as Garland’s preparations for the assault on El Molino had been in progress, Grant had gone to him and made a strong plea to be formally assigned to join the men that would do the fighting. He had argued that the final battle to capture the Mexican capital was starting and that if they didn’t win there would be no need for a quartermaster lieutenant. The battle was to be victory or death. If it was to be death, he wanted his to be fighting with his Fourth Infantry.

  Without comment or expression, Garland listened to Grant’s argument to the end. Then he gave Grant a bleak smile. “My orders are to help capture the Molino and to stop any reinforcements coming from Chapultepec. Your name will be on the roster of those men of the Fourth Infantry.”

  A noticeable lessening of the darkness came and with it there was a stirring of the men as a whispered order from Garland at the front passed down from officer to officer. The brigade crept another hundred yards nearer the Molino and just behind Drum’s battery of 6-pounders and there halted on the road to again wait.

  Grant saw the grim walls of the Molino form up ghost-like out of the morning dusk. He could make out the windows opening out to the front and the parapet extending above the flat roofline. Both were excellent locations from which enemy riflemen could shoot while still being protected from return fire. Had he been the commanding general he wouldn’t be attacking the Molino and Chapultepec, but rather attacking the capital from the north. He had been in that direction on a foraging expedition and examined the gates through his field glasses and knew they were less well defended than the southern and western gates. Of course he must in honesty to General Scott, admit that getting the army there could be a problem.

  He rose to his knees for a better view of the battlefield. The principal assault column, the five hundred “forlorn hopes”, led by Major Wright was located in a low swale between the command post and the Molino. The name “forlorn hopes” came from the immense danger the men would face as they charged forward to capture the Mexican cannon entrenched in front of the wall of the Molino. Grant knew that many of the men of that initial charge would die. The cash bonuses and promotions promised to obtain the volunteers would mean nothing to dead men.

  The WHUMP of one of the 24-pound, smoothbore cannon jarred the air. A gaping fissure appeared in the front wall near the center of the Molino as the solid ball struck. A section of the roof above collapsed, tumbling men and weapons into the void. Mexicans were dead. The battle had begun.

  The two big siege guns continued to work, two shots per minute, shaking the ground. A cloud of hot gunpowder smoke formed in the quiet air and hung over the battery. Twelve rounds boomed out and then the guns fell silent. Much too soon, thought Grant. The defenses could not yet have been much weakened. He rose to his feet for an unobstructed view. The five hundred “forlorn hopes” were dashing toward the entrenched Mexican artillery. The presence of the men on the field had halted the firing of the big siege guns. Why hadn’t Wright waited for the guns to knock the building into rubble with cannonballs and kill the Mexicans manning the artillery?

  The Mexican cannon roared and flung a furious storm of grape and canister into the Americans. The charging blue line flinched. Men began to fall, a few, then by the tens as the cannon kept firing. The line of “forlorn hopes” was shredded and torn wholesale, the name proving too awfully true. Behind the line of soldiers still on their feet and moving forward, the ground was littered with blue-clad bodies.

  Muskets crackled out from the windows and the roof parapets of the Molino, adding their blizzard of lead balls to do slaughter. Much reduced in number, Wright’s men reached the cannons in front of the Molino, swarmed over them, and shooting and stabbing drove off the artillerists and the infantry stationed there to guard the guns.

  The Mexican musket fire from the Molino proved too deadly and Wright’s men faltered and broke. They whirled and ran toward the rear. Mexicans surged out of the Molino and onto the Americans left at the battery of cannon. Grant saw the Mexicans shooting the Americans left lying wounded on the ground. They began to search through the pockets to rob the dead.

  Smith’s battalion leapt forward down the slope of the hill from where they had waited and swept over the battery of cannon. Taking heavy losses, the battalion was brought to a halt. Smith stood among the hissing bullets and shouted at his men and they regrouped behind him. With Smith leading, the men again stormed toward the center of the Molino.

  Grant felt a tightening of his chest for he feared for the safety of his good friend Fred Dent who was a commander of a company of Smith’s battalion. Then his attention was yanked to the front by Garland’s stentorian yell to charge. The brigade burst into a run at the Molino. They were met by withering canister and grape fire and Garland ordered a withdrawal to Drum’s battery of guns.

  Grant flung a look around to see from where the killing fire was coming. Sergeant Robertson, a man Grant knew was shouting and pointing. “There! There!” He was pointing at Mexican cannons on the thrashing floor of the Molino.

  “Our boys are shooting at the wrong place,” Grant yelled back to Robertson. “Help me.”

  Grant and Robertson ran to help the artillerymen place their pieces correctly and bring their fire against the Mexican guns on the thrashing floor. Taking advantage of the cover from the singing bullets provided by a stone wall, they shoved a pair of the guns to within less than two hundred yards of the Mexicans and opened fire with canister. The shells exploding among the Mexicans drove them from their guns to flee into the mill.

  Grant and Robertson joined with Captain Thorn of the Fourth Infantry and his party of men and charged toward the mill. A short ways farther along, Grant halted abruptly; Fred Dent was slumped over unconscious and bleeding from a wound in his thigh. Grant swiftly examined the wound and found it wasn’t too serious. He laid Dent upon the flat top of a nearby wall where the hospital orderlies could easily spot him when they came searching for the wounded.

  Grant waited for a slackening in the enemy’s fire, and then ran through the smoke to overtake Thorn and Robertson breaking down one of the barricaded doors leading into the Molino. As he drew near the two men he saw a Mexican running at Thorn and about to sink a bayonet into his back.

  “Look out!” Grant yelled.

  Thorn sprang out of the way. Robertson had heard the Grant’s shout and whirled and seeing the danger, shot the Mexican through the head.

  The interior of the cavernous Molino was full of the enemy and the fighting was ferocious, pistols popping and muskets banging. Grant quickly emptied his two pistols into brown-faced men. The firing stopped with all guns empty and the fighting became one of stabbing bayonets and swinging sabers.

  The Americans took the big room and hurried to the door to the next one. There they halted, speedily reloaded, and shooting through the open door, emptied their weapons into the room. They charged in with bayonets and swords ready. Grant cutting ferociously with his steel blade and stepping over and trampling upon the fallen enemy, went forward with his comrades. The Mexicans gave ground slowly. He saw a young Mexican captain with a slender body and a aristocratic Spanish face swiftly dispatch two Americans with a narrow, two edged sword. After the second man fell, the Americans held back knowing th
eir clumsy bayonets were no match for the agile man with the sword. With a taunting smile of belief in his skill, the Mexican motioned with his sword to come at him.

  Robertson glanced at Grant as if to say, you have a sword so that man is yours to fight. Grant warily evaluated the captain. Mexico City was famous for its dueling schools where wealthy young men were taught the use of pistol and sword. This captain must be one of those pupils. Still there was nothing else to do but fight. Grant sprang forward and took on the Mexican. They parried, cut, thrust. Within half a minute, Grant wished he had practiced his swordsmanship more diligently. He was far out-classed.

  With mastery and strength, the captain parried one of Grant’s strikes. Instantly and with amazing speed he moved sideways to come in on the side while Grant’s saber had been knocked out of position. Grant knew the Mexican had him. He was as good as dead.

  The captain’s foot came down upon a musket lying on the floor and he was thrown momentarily off balance. As he caught himself, the expression on his face of believing he had certain victory changed to one of sudden doubt.

  Now! Strike! The warrior in Grant shouted. Grant lunged forward, and as he did so brought his saber in, aligned its point just so, and thrust it out fiercely at his foe. The honed steel point of the blade pierced the man’s front just below his rib cage and exited out his back. With a great sense of his life given back, Grant wrenched his saber free.

  The Mexican captain, his brown, pain-filled eyes locked on Grant, put out a hand to hold himself erect. His hand found only air and he fell to the floor of the mill.

  Grant yelled out to the Americans around him. “Press them! Press them!”

  The stalled Americans doggedly moved ahead stabbing and cutting. The Mexicans stubbornly gave ground toward the opposite side of the big room. Their backs came up against the far wall. One frightened foe spotted a door close by and broke and fled out through it. The remaining twenty or so Mexicans scrambled for the door, bunched up for a moment at the narrow opening, then broke out onto a paved courtyard. There they split up and ran swiftly into the cypress trees behind the Molino. Grant and the squad of men with him followed out onto the courtyard and watched the Mexicans fleeing in the direction of Chapultepec Hill.