Edwin L. Sabin

“ All the bright morning was dulled by powder and rent by the cheering, the yelling, and the continuous reports of muskets and cannon. From the angle of the wall where the Fourth crouched, the battlefield to the west stretched full in view—the soldiers charging down across it, staggering, limping, crumpling, but closing ranks as they tore on, their bayonets set. The Cadwalader reinforcements and the Light Battalion had mingled with the shattered Wright column; they were bearing on together, and disappeared in the cactus-fringed trenches. What of Hannibal, Jerry wondered. ”

“ The larger part of the army had been swallowed by the chaparral; but now and again a column of blue-uniformed men could be sighted, winding through a cleared spot, as if gradually encircling the city on the land side.
All day the city forts and outworks and the castle pitched round-shot and shell into the dunes. There were several little battles when the Mexican lancers and infantry outposts met the American advance. A number of wounded Mexican soldiers were carried in; but the American flags kept coming on, bobbing here and there, bound inland. ”

“ General Worth and staff spurred ahead. The sun was reddening the east. Jerry could see the men’s faces, pinched and dirty, white and unshaven. The ranks were panting—their shoes clogged with mud, their uniforms drenched and smeared, their guns and knapsacks dripping. How far were Contreras and the Mexican army now? A fight would be warming, if nothing else. Any instant a halt might be ordered to recharge the muskets and get ready.
Hark! The fresh morning air was set atremble by another roll of cannon and musketry fire. Smoke arose before, maybe two miles distant in the northwest. ”

“ The enemy was rallying. His bugles pealed, his officers were shouting and urging, a column boiled into the street before. As quick as thought the two guns of the gateway battery had been reversed—“Clear the way, there!”—and a shower of grape scattered the column.
The bugles sounded again, with the Mexican signal for recall.
The other regiments thronged in: the Second Artillery, the Sixth Infantry, the Eighth (with Hannibal rolling his drum and cheering lustily) , the Third Artillery, the Fifth Infantry, the Voltigeurs; all the Worth foot. ”

“ The road climbed and climbed. The horses of the Duncan flying battery of the Second Artillery, and those of the wagon train, had all they could do, even when helped by men at the wheels. But the day was clear, and an inspiring sight that was to look before and behind, and see the serried column winding on, Captain Kearny’s Company K of the First [158] Dragoons ahead, General Worth and staff following; the artillery afoot, and the infantry and their bands trudging gallantly after, and the white-topped wagons bringing up the rear. ”

“ The sailors appeared to be cheering as they toiled. The guns thundered and smoked—recoiled as if alive and eager, were sponged and loaded and run out again; every man was on the jump, but they all moved like clockwork. Cowering there, back of the magazine, and glued to the side of the trench, Jerry stared roundly. Nobody paid any attention to him. All were too busy to take heed of a ragged boy.
“Bang!” A return shot had arrived. It was a shell, and had burst so near that the fragments and the dirt rained down.
“Bang!” Another. The naval battery had been discovered, and Jerry was under fire. ”

“ The men yelled—a Cerro Gordo shout. They stumbled, fell, splashed into ditches four feet wide. Lieutenant Grant was running and waving his sword in front of his company. All the officers were cheering on their men. The breastworks loomed higher, the cannon muzzles gaped wider.
The line swept on; the front rank began to climb—the men slipping and clutching and clinging, and ever advancing their muskets to pull trigger. Over they went with yells renewed; up and over went the rear rank, and over went the fifers and drummers, tumbling into the cheering mass. ”

“ The fifteen hundred of them had taken the hill, defended by breastworks and the stone tower and six thousand Mexican soldiers. Huzzah! Huzzah! Huzzah!
And now here was General Scott, on his horse. The men ran for him, the wounded crawled nearer or feebly cheered; tears were flooding his grizzled cheeks; he removed his hat, and his voice trembled.
“Brother soldiers! I am proud to call you brothers, and your country will be proud to hear of your conduct this day. Our victory has cost us the lives of a number of brave men, but they died fighting for their country. ”

“ Although General Winfield Scott was nicknamed by the soldiers “Old Fuss and Feathers,” they intended no disrespect. On the contrary, they loved him, and asked only that he lead them. No general ever lived who was more popular with the men in the ranks. They had every kind of confidence in him; they knew that “Old Fuss and Feathers” would look out for them like a father, and would take them through.
His arrival, all in his showy uniform, upon his splendid horse, along the lines, was the signal for cheers and for the bands to strike up “Hail to the Chief.” ”

“ Still there was no firing by the American cannon. What was being done, in that brush, none of the Vera Cruzans could say from such a distance. Only——
“It will be a siege,” the wise-acres nodded. “Very well. We shall wait until the vomito comes. The vomito will fight for us, in the sand hills where our brave soldiers cannot go. The yellow fever will find those skulking gringos, who dare not attack us.” ”

“ Cannon were bellowing from the Second Division’s hill—sending grape and solid shot into the Mexican entrenchments upon Telegraph Hill. The Mexicans were replying.
Huzzah! The long roll sounded, signaling to the men to be alert.
“Fall in! Fall in!” the sergeants shouted; and the assembly was not needed. Company B was ready in a jiffy, the men with muskets in hand, their cartridge boxes and bayonet scabbards in place, their knapsacks and their haversacks with two days’ rations hanging from their shoulders. They formed a single rank facing to the right. ”

“ It silenced the mortars, and drove the American gunners to cover. Nobody could see to shoot in such a dust storm. The people were happy over it. They knew that the northers and the yellow fever would come to their rescue. The Americans were crazy, their guns useless, their trenches would be filled faster than they could be dug. But to Jerry the norther looked like a lucky stroke for one American, at least. To slip over the walls and sneak across the flat strip and enter the American camp would be as easy as—well, as cutting a watermelon. ”

“ The army was erecting another battery, nearby—Battery Number 4, of the heaviest army cannon, sixty-eight-pounders and twenty-four-pounders. Pretty soon these would join with the navy fire.
The work in the sick bay slackened, and Jerry stole up “forward” again. The din and the rush were as bad as ever. The sailors, bared to the waist, were black with powder grime and streaked with sweat, on faces, bodies and arms. The guns were alive and alert—they were monsters, belching, darting back, fuming, while they waited to be fed, then eagerly darting to belch once more. ”

“ That had been a long and hard march from Perote: with the days warm and showery, and the nights cold and frosty, and the men sleeping on the ground in the dirt, without tents, and trudging by day through mud and dust both. But here at Amozoc, the alcalde or mayor met General Worth on the outskirts of the town and invited him in, and when the column entered the women came running from their adobe houses, bringing fruit and pitchers of cold water. ”

“ The tactics of General Scott have brought the army to a fine state of discipline. The American regular army is the best in the world, and the Volunteers will soon be not far behind. As I have not served long under General Scott, of course I cannot say much about his strategy when in command of a large body of troops. One thing is sure: he has the ablest engineers yet produced, to help him carry out his plans, and a splendidly trained army, both officers and rank and file, to perform his plans; and officers and men are confident that his plans will be thoroughly sound. ”

“ General Worth, dark and flashing-eyed, sitting his horse like a field marshal, called for three cheers.
“Huzzah! Huzzah! Huzzah!”
In column of sections five men wide the First passed through the gate, and upon the National Road to the City of Mexico.
“Form platoons—march!”
“Route step—march!”
From close order of thirteen inches distance the ranks fell back to twenty-eight inches, or one pace, apart. The men might carry their guns at will, always with the muzzles up; they need not keep step and might talk. ”

“ Here were five thousand Americans, almost the whole army, in the plaza and surrounded by buildings and two hundred thousand people.
The orders were quick. In an instant Duncan’s battery and the Reno howitzers galloped to the plaza corners; Steptoe’s and Drum’s and Taylor’s guns were being unlimbered. Aides from General Scott were spurring hither thither; skirmish squads were being told off, and ordered to search the streets and buildings. The dragoons galloped. The howitzers battered the building from which the first volley had issued. ”

“ And the entrenched line of blue-coats, supporting the artillery, might be glimpsed.
“Those dons are trying to find our guns,” asserted Hannibal. “That plain is full of trenches. Golly, but it was a job to dig them. We Regulars, and the Mohawks, too, had to work by night, in shifts; and we got jolly well peppered, you bet. We didn’t dare use lanterns; worked by the feel, in the cactus and brush, and the northers near smothered us, besides. We were marched out after dark, and every man grabbed a spade and his orders were to dig a hole eight feet long and five feet wide and six feet deep. ”

“ The American cannon had done little damage to it yet. The mortar bombs all passed over, to land in the city. But Jerry remembered a spot where he often had climbed before, in fun—and to show the Vera Cruzans that their wall could not keep a boy in.
He had to guess at the spot, in the wind and the darkness. When he thought that he was there, he shinned up. Here the wind struck him full blast, and whew! He had to lie flat and crawl, clutching fast with fingers and toes, feeling his way, and fairly plastered to the rough top. If once he raised up, away he would go like a leaf ”

“ The soldiers stiffened to attention—Hannibal like the rest, and Jerry trying to imitate. Every hand went to a salute. General Worth was as fine a looking man as one might ever see—tall and straight in the saddle, with handsome face, dark complexion, flashing black eyes, and side-whiskers of graying black. ”

“ Cap’n Lee, of the engineers, made his way back to general headquarters at San Augustine. He got in about eleven o’clock with dispatches—the only officer out of eight that tried to open communication between Smith and Scott. He came all the way from Smith, some four miles across the lava, and through the Mexican scouts—had to feel with hands and knees, for it’s black as the inside of your hat, out doors, and raining pitchforks. Smith intends to attack by the rear at daylight, before Santy Annie gets down from up the road; asks for a frontal attack at same time to help him out. ”

“ Valiant soldiers! Do not harm us, and God will reward you.” They saw Jerry, and recognized him. “Gringo puppy,” they hissed. “Where have you been?”
“Yes, I’m a gringo,” Jerry answered. “And I’m in the army of the Americans. You said they couldn’t take Vera Cruz. What do you say now?”
“They took Vera Cruz by standing off and killing all the people,” old Manuel snarled, in Spanish. “But wait, till they try to march on. Our Santa Anna and fifty thousand brave men are coming to meet them. Hear that, gringito? You’ll wish you’d stayed in the brush with old Manuel.” ”

“ The Duncan battery section, with the Voltigeurs running to keep up, was galloping to head the lancers off. And the Sumner dragoons and Rifles were changing front to meet the charge.
The battery was there first—unlimbered in a twinkling—the lancers, a mass of red and yellow, their lances set, tore in for it. Colonel Duncan waited—waited—and when his guns at last burst into canister and grape, with gunners working like mad, the close ranks of the Mexican cavalry melted [266] away in the manner of grain before a giant scythe. ”

“ Light marching orders was the word—but at that, what with the muskets which weighed fourteen pounds, and the cartridge boxes which weighed eight pounds, and the haversacks and knapsacks and blanket rolls and heavy belts, the canteens of water, bayonets in scabbards, and so forth, every man carried about forty pounds not including his woollen clothing. The tents and the extra clothing were left at Vera Cruz; Lieutenant Smith and Lieutenant Grant left their chests and spare outfits—and Jerry rejoiced, for he now had little to guard. ”

“ A brilliant group of officers were riding along the shallow trench or road at the inside base of the sand hill parapets. The foremost was a very large man, broad shouldered and erect and towering high upon his horse. He had a square, stern, wrinkled face, smooth shaven except for grey side-whiskers of regulation trim; wore a plumed [83] chapeau upon his grey hair, full uniform of dark blue, with gold buttons in a double row down the front, heavy gold epaulets on the shoulders, and broad gold braid following his trousers seams. A sword in engraved scabbard hung at his left side ”