A Gallant Little Army

by Timothy D Johnson

  Within Valencia’s camp, there was sudden activity as his soldiers scampered about in surprise. The entire camp appeared to be in a “hubbub.” “They seem not to have believed in the possibility or rather probability of an attack in the rear.” They hastily improvised a defensive line that faced west and succeeded in turning two of their guns and opening fire with grape and canister. As Riley’s spearhead smashed into their ranks, the Seventh Infantry and Rifle Regiment charged right into the Mexican guns. Enemies fired at each other from point-blank range, but hand-to-hand fighting quickly became the prevalent mode of combat. As the Voltigeurs approached the Mexican position a minute later, the enemy line still maintained enough integrity to fire a volley into the oncoming second wave. Nevertheless, the hilltop was already covered with Americans and Mexicans locked in close, desperate struggles: clubbing with musket butts, thrusting with bayonets, and slashing with sabers. Unit cohesion within Valencia’s command quickly melted away as infantry and lancers became intermingled in the confusion. Within minutes, confusion turned to panic and panic to flight.7

  Mexican troops ran in every direction, some of them “firing a farewell shot at the detested yankees” as they left the field. Pierce’s troops around Padierna could see what was happening atop the ridge, knew what the pell-mell disorder within the Mexican camp meant, and charged up the hill from the east. Riley’s Fourth Artillery, commanded by Major John L. Gardner, led a dash for the artillery pieces. While fighting hand to hand amid the guns, a Mexican soldier knocked Gardner’s sword away with a musket, but just as he lurched forward with his bayonet, he was shot down by another American. The gunners spiked their pieces and joined their comrades in flight. The natural direction for the Mexican troops to flee was north toward the rest of their army and the safety of the capital, and many ran in that direction. However, General Smith had held the tail of his flanking column in reserve slightly north and still concealed in the ravine. These troops emerged and began to fire into the Mexican flank as they ran, and still further north, Shields’s brigade, which had remained at San Geronimo to keep an eye on Santa Anna, was ideally situated to cut off their retreat. Shields had placed the volunteers of the Palmetto Regiment and the New York Regiment along the side of the road leading to San Angel, and they “opened a most destructive fire upon the mingled masses of Infantry and Cavalry.”8

  The typical American soldier took pride in bloodshed, whether it be the blood of friend or foe, as is borne out by the following comments. Several days after the successful charge, D. H. Hill wrote that he would “always feel proud to have commanded the company which suffered most severely.” Warren Lothrop wrote to his family about his part in the battle, telling them that he fired his musket eleven times during the melee. “I know what affect A part of my shots had but I do not feel like boasting of it.” Another soldier wrote home to tell his mother about the assault and the pursuit that followed. We “murdered the wretched enemy for 3 miles in retreat,” he wrote. Then he gave a synopsis of his role in all of the battles. “I think I have killed personally about 10 but am unable to say of which rank as I fired at a column and had not time to show a preference. I think though I have blood enough on my hands to satisfy the largest patriotism.”9

  The field remained a dangerous place, with shots being fired all around, when Gardner leaned against one of the captured guns to catch his breath. Here and there, pockets of Mexicans still resisted; others were either surrendering or trying to evade capture. Amid the confusion, George McClellan, a West Point classmate, came up and, with a smile on his face, slapped Gardner on the back. Then he introduced his friend and fellow engineer Beauregard. The twenty-three-year-old Gardner would later serve as a general in the Civil War, like McClellan and Beauregard, but unlike the other two, a severe leg wound at First Bull Run would limit his role and relegate him to obscurity. The two guns they were standing next to, they later discovered, were the two that had been captured from the Fourth Artillery six months earlier at the Battle of Buena Vista when that unit was in Zachary Taylor’s army.10

  The battle quickly subsided, and most of the gunfire gradually shifted north as U.S. troops pursued Valencia and his disorganized mob toward San Angel. Nearby, General Persifor Smith looked at his watch then commented to his staff: “It has taken just seventeen minutes.” The field was strewn with muskets, cartridge boxes, caps, and other accoutrements along with the dead and dying, and a trail of such accessories, although scattered in every direction, generally led north. While other units joined the pursuit, Riley’s brigade rounded up prisoners. Fabian Brydolf, an Iowan and a sergeant serving in the Fifteenth Infantry, had lost his boots in the march around Valencia’s flank. Writing about his experiences years later, he recalled that “my Shoes wher some waat large and stuck in the mud.” He charged the enemy line barefooted, and after the battle, he found a dead Mexican officer, pulled off his boots, and tried them on. He discovered to his delight that “they fittet me to perfection. Such is War.”11

  Lee had followed Pierce’s men from Padierna up the hill to the Mexican camp and arrived there just after the battle ended. He saw his friend Joe Johnston, who had stormed the position from the other direction with the Voltigeurs. Lee had been present the previous day near Padierna when Johnston’s nephew, Preston, received his mortal wound while servicing Magruder’s battery. Johnston was exuberant over the quick and decisive victory when Lee approached his old friend with a solemn look on his face. He extended his hand and told Johnston that his nephew had died during the night. Johnston slumped into the abandoned trenches, and his body “shivered with agony” as he wept. Preston was the son Joe Johnston never had, and Preston had faithfully nursed his uncle back to health after his Cerro Gordo wound. His nephew’s death was a devastating blow. Five days later, Johnston wrote to his brother about the “full bitterness of grief” that he felt. “I loved him more than my own heart,” Johnston wrote. Such is war.12

  American losses were severe from Johnston’s grieving perspective, but actually they were relatively few in number. Most accounts repeat Scott’s statement in his battle report, which places American losses at sixty, but Riley, whose brigade led the charge and suffered most of the casualties, gave his losses as eighty-three killed and wounded. Mexican losses, however, were staggering—in fact, Valencia’s force essentially ceased to exist. Seven hundred killed, over eight hundred captured, including four generals and eighty-eight officers, seven hundred pack mules, and twenty-two cannon, along with small arms and ammunition, all constituted the Mexican losses in personnel and matériel.13

  The brief engagement at Padierna, typically called the Battle of Contreras, was only the beginning of a long day of fighting. By 7:00 A.M., scattered American units from Pillow’s and Twiggs’s division were pursuing the remnants of Valencia’s shocked command toward San Angel. The Mexicans stopped and made a brief stand near San Geronimo before resuming their retreat through cornfields and ravines. Santa Anna, who had been reinforced during the night, made plans to push south again that morning in an effort to reestablish communications with Valencia. However, no sooner had he begun to venture forth from San Angel than he began to run into panicked Mexican soldiers streaming north. Now Santa Anna exploded with rage. He was angry at Valencia for not obeying his order to withdraw the previous day, and he ordered Valencia shot by the first person who found him. He took out his frustration on the retreating soldiers by striking them with his riding crop as they fled past him. At the moment, all he could do was assign Brigadier General Joaquín Rangel’s brigade as a rear guard to delay the American pursuit while he tried to organize a new defensive line farther north.14

  The Americans pursued the retreating Mexicans to San Angel, and Pillow and Twiggs soon joined their commands there. Pillow had arisen early and was crossing the southern edge of the Pedregal when the rout began. He joined Smith and Twiggs on the road north of Padierna, and the three generals fell in behind their men. When they arrived at San Angel, Pillow sent word to Scott that he would
continue to press the enemy north. In the early morning, the commanding general was also on the move. Leaving San Agustin, he rode to Padierna, saw the littered landscape of battle and the groups of prisoners held under guard, then issued orders to take advantage of the circumstances that were unfolding. The previous night, Scott had instructed Quitman and Worth to march their men west at dawn so that he could throw the entire weight of his army at Valencia, but seeing the situation, he immediately sent orders to the two division commanders to turn their units around and head for San Antonio. In this three-day-old chess match, Scott had been probing and searching for the best way to get his army around natural and man-made obstacles of rock and enemy troops. Now an unexpected opportunity presented itself to turn the San Antonio defenders out of their position by having Worth and Quitman attack them in front while Pillow and Twiggs marched across the north of the Pedregal to trap them in a vice. Scott wanted to settle this day’s affair by utilizing movement and position, an aspect of combat in which this author of a tactical manual excelled.

  Before he followed the path of his men up the San Angel Road, he came across Lieutenant Beauregard. The commanding general knew that the young lieutenant was but one of a host of engineers who had once again played a crucial role in gathering intelligence, mapping roads, and locating enemy weaknesses. With pride and gratitude, he looked at the twenty-nine-year-old and said, “Young man, if I were not on horseback, I would embrace you.” Then, turning to his staff, he exclaimed, “Gentlemen, if West Point had only produced the Corps of Engineers, the Country ought to be proud of that institution.” The commanding general also came across members of the Fourth Artillery, complimenting the men in “the most extravagant manner.” Then, having learned about the two brass guns that the regiment had repossessed, he asserted that the pieces should henceforth bear the inscription: “Lost by the 4th Artillery at Buena Vista without dishonor and recovered by the same with glory at Mexico.”15

  As Scott and his staff rode north along the road, he passed soldiers who stopped and cheered when they saw the commanding general. The men were exuberant about the ease with which they routed the enemy that morning. Reflecting a few days later, Lieutenant Roswell Ripley of Pillow’s staff called it the “most glorious” victory the army had won to date. It seemed amazing that just the previous night, half of Scott’s army was in peril of being crushed by two larger enemy forces, but in William Walker’s words, “we extricated ourselves from a dangerous position before a superior foe by a brilliant victory.”16 Much of the credit belonged to brigade commanders who, through bold leadership, sought ways to translate a bad situation into success.

  Winfield Scott also deserved acknowledgment for avoiding Santa Anna’s traps and consistently placing his army in a position to exploit enemy mistakes. With each battle, respect for the commander rose. Lieutenant Isaac Stevens observed that during the entire affair around the Pedregal, Scott was “perfectly composed and assured.” Even before leaving Puebla, Lieutenant John Sedgwick had informed his sister that he viewed Scott “as one of the great men of the day, and it would be the greatest misfortune to this army if anything should befall him.” Four days after the battle, John Wilkins of the Third Infantry wrote that Scott’s “generalship, dignity, coolness & forsight have placed him ahead of any general living.” Twenty-three-year-old Thomas Jackson acknowledged that in casual conversation, Scott came across as arrogant and opinionated, but in discussions on military topics, “you may expect to call forth the mighty powers of his mighty mind, and upon information so obtained I would rather rely than on all the other officers in our armies in Mexico.” A bond had developed between the general and his army as the men came to realize that beneath his stern and arrogant exterior, Old Fuss and Feathers was wise, fair, and gracious. “He is proud of his officers & men & they have every confidence & faith in him,” Wilkins observed. And so as Scott rode north toward San Angel, receiving periodic praise from his men, he stopped on one occasion, took off his hat, and said, “thanks be to God for the Victory & glory to this Gallant little Army.” When the soldiers cheered again, he said, “it’s not for you to cheer me but me to cheer you.” The affection was mutual.17

  The Mexicans were as demoralized as the Americans were elated. Letters to their families written on August 20 and 21 expressed extreme disappointment on the part of Santa Anna’s soldiers. One writer exclaimed, “Judas! All is lost—eternal shame for us. . . . The scene of Cerro Gordo has been repeated exactly.” Another summed up what happened at Padierna by lamenting, “In war the Yankees know no rest—no fear.” Yet another wrote of his bewilderment about how the American army got between Valencia and Santa Anna without any aid given to the former. A member of the Mexican Congress thought he knew how such a thing could happen: “there is great weakness and ignorance and very little honor shown on the part of our generals.” And the defeat was rendered all the more bitter when one considers the confidence that many of the defenders felt just twenty-four hours earlier. After the coming battle, the Americans will not “laugh in their beard, as they have on former occasions,” wrote one man. At least some Mexicans agreed with the American assessment of the quality of Scott’s leadership, for in one letter, a soldier referred to “Scott, a man of superior talents in the art of war.”18

  Some final assessments of the early morning fighting on August 20 deserve notice. Scott made the following laudatory assertion in his battle report: “I doubt whether a more brilliant or decisive victory—taking into view ground, artificial defences, batteries, and the extreme disparity of numbers—without cavalry or artillery on our side—is to be found on record.” D. H. Hill penned this conclusion in his diary a week later: “There has been nothing in the whole war so brilliant as the storming of the heights of Contreras.” Also, reflecting a growing lack of respect for Mexican soldiers, Captain Moses Barnard offered this critical appraisal of his opponents: “the Mexicans have naturally a great gift in erecting fortifications, but very little bravery in defending them.”19 But the day’s fighting was not over, and the Mexican soldiers would give reason for Barnard to amend his critique that afternoon.

  At San Angel, Twiggs and Pillow prepared, after a brief halt, to push on to Coyoacán on the north side of the Pedregal. The latter had recently rejoined his men and assumed command of both divisions along with Shields’s brigade (Quitman’s division). Pillow ordered General Smith to put the Company of Engineers and the Mounted Rifles in the lead, and Smith sent his staff officer Lieutenant Earl Van Dorn to make the proper disposition. Van Dorn caught up with Lieutenant Gustavus W. Smith of the engineers and relayed Pillow’s orders to prepare his company to lead the army forward. Smith explained that he had spotted a tall building near San Angel just a few hundred yards away, and he wished to go there and survey the area from the top of it. Smith believed that he “would be able to get a good view of the level country for miles around, and obtain quite definite knowledge of the positions and movements of the main Mexican forces.” It was the kind of thing that Scott certainly would have wanted, but the order came from Pillow, so Smith canceled his reconnaissance initiative and reported at the head of the column.20

  As they approached Coyoacán, Scott, along with Nicholas Trist, caught up and accompanied the troops into the town. While riding with his generals, they spotted Colonel Riley for the first time since his successful dawn attack and in the commanding general’s presence Pillow proclaimed, “You have earned the Yellow sash [of a general officer], Sir, and you shall have it.” Flushed with the day’s success and assigning to himself an inflated amount of the responsibility, it appeared, as Trist put it, that Pillow had become the “dispenser in Mexico, of those rewards and honours.” The commanding general likely just bit his tongue, because he knew better than to cross the president’s factotum.21

  By the time they reached Coyoacán, Scott and Santa Anna were probably closer to each other than they had been thus far in the campaign, for the Mexican general was in Churubusco organizing a new defensive line. The
town was really just a collection of a few houses scattered on the south side of the river, and its name, Churubusco, was derived from an Aztec word meaning “place of the war god”—appropriate enough for the unfolding events of this day. Santa Anna had earlier ordered Major General Nicolás Bravo to give up his fortifications at San Antonio and retreat to Churubusco. Then, to cover Bravo’s withdrawal, Santa Anna improvised a new defensive line around the town where most of his retreating troops were headed. This new line ran from the Convent of San Mateo to a bridge over the Churubusco River 450 yards away. The convent, an old Franciscan monastery built in 1678, sat on the road from Coyoacán, and, located just west of the village of Churubusco, it anchored the Mexican right. Its sturdy walls were four feet thick and twelve feet high. Parapets along the roof, a walled enclosure, earthworks facing Coyoacán, and an irrigation ditch made the convent a formidable bastion. There Santa Anna placed seven artillery pieces and 1,800 infantry consisting of national guard units along with the San Patricio Battalion, all under the command of Major General Manuel Rincón. The Mexican left rested on the bank of the river just north of the village at the fortified southern end of the bridge—the tête de pont. This hastily but well-constructed earthen fortification mounted artillery and infantry from General Francisco Pérez’s brigade. From the bridge, Pérez extended his line east along the river with two regiments, and his men were determined to hold the river crossing until Bravo’s San Antonio force crossed over. Additional Mexican infantry lined fieldworks connecting these two strong points, and Santa Anna placed several reserve regiments on the north side of the river.22

  The San Patricio (St. Patrick) Battalion constituted the heart of the defenders at the convent. It consisted of deserters from the U.S. Army, many of whom were Irish Catholic. The unit had been organized by John Riley, who deserted from Taylor’s army on the Rio Grande in April 1846, because as an immigrant and a Catholic, he was persecuted. Riley, like many of his San Patricio comrades, was not a naturalized American citizen, so he felt no special allegiance to the army or the country. Harsh punishment doled out by American officers seemed to fall most heavily on immigrant soldiers, and as a consequence served as a strong motive for desertion. The Mexicans had circulated leaflets on numerous occasions in an effort to induce disaffected soldiers to desert and join their army. During the army’s ten weeks in Puebla, several men had slipped away and joined the San Patricios. The unit had manned a battery at Cerro Gordo, and now at the convent, they would fight with seven guns. Of the 204 battalion members who manned those guns with great effect, 142 were Irishmen.23