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his
cork leg. The Mexican army was completely dispersed, yet the
Mexican government declared its determination to carry on the war,
and never make peace with the United States of the
north.
3. After this victory, the Americans,
without resistance, took possession of Jalapa, of
Perote, guarded by the strongest fortress in Mexico after
San Juan de Ulloa, and of Puebla, a city second only in
importance to the capital. Here Scott waited nearly three
months to replenish his army.
Santa Anna, meanwhile, was planning new
means for the defence of the capital. He organized bands of
guerrillas to cut off the communication of the Americans with Vera
Cruz, and with surprising energy, in the face of many
difficulties, raised another army to oppose their advance.
4. Scott resumed his march towards
the capital, August 7, after having received
reënforcements.
In three days the army had passed the
crest of the Cordilleras, when the grand valley of Mexico burst
upon their gaze. Lakes, plains, cities, and cloud-capped mountains
spread around and beneath. "Far to the left was descried the giant
peak of Popocatapetl; before them lay the Lake Tezcuco; and
beyond, the domes and towers of the Montezumas."1 But
in the path of the invaders lay more than thirty thousand Mexican
troops, and strong fortifications to be
overcome.
5. The Americans advanced cautiously, and
met with no opposition till the 19th, when they found their march
impeded by the fortified camp of Contreras, fourteen miles
from the city of Mexico. The next morning the camp was assaulted
and carried. This success was followed, the same day, by the
forcing of San Antonio, and the brilliant victory of
Churubusco, and the whole Mexican army was driven back upon
the city.
In these engagements nine thousand
Americans had routed more than three times as many Mexicans, with
a loss to the vanquished of seven thousand, including among the
prisoners eight generals. The loss of the Americans was little
more than one thousand in killed and wounded. After these
victories General Scott granted an armistice to Santa Anna
for the purpose of negotiating a peace. Perceiving, however, that
negotiations would be of no avail, and that the treacherous
Mexican was strengthening his defences, hostilities were
resumed.
1 The Montezumas were a race of native kings that occupied the throne of Mexico before the conquest by Cortez (see p. 12, ¶ 2).
QUESTIONS. -- 3. After this victory, of what places did the Americans take possession? How long and for what purpose did Scott wait at Puebla? -- How was Santa Anna employed meanwhile? 4. When did Scott resume his march towards the capital? -- What lay in the path of the invaders? 5. When and where did the Americans find their march impeded? What was done on the morning of the 20th? What other successes followed the same day? -- what farther is said of these engagements? What of an armistice?
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6. On September 8,
General Worth took by storm the strong position of Molino del
Rey.1 On the 13th, the almost inaccessible castle
of Chapultepec, the last fortification that defended the
capital, yielded to the victorious Americans, and the next day the
army entered the city, and the stars and stripes waved over the
national palace.2
Santa Anna fled from the city, and
collected a portion of his demoralized army; but his efforts were
ineffectual, and the vanquished chief soon after escaped from the
country.
1 The King's Mill.
2 In this series of battles, Generals Twiggs, Worth, Pillow, Shields, Cadwalader, Colonel Harney, and other brave and efficient officers, nobly seconded their able commander-in-chief. Among the gallant officers who won brevets at Contreras, Churubusco, and Chapultepec, were Captain Robert E. Lee, Lieutenants P. G. T. Beauregard, Daniel H. Hill, Thomas J. Jackson, and George B. McClellan. Lieutenants Don Carlos Buell, James Longstreet, Nathaniel Lyon, Earl Van Dorn, John Sedgwick, and Captain Philip Kearny, at Contreras and Churubusco, and Captains Joseph Hooker and Jesse L. Reno, at Chapultepec, also gained brevet rank. Among the officers brevetted for gallant conduct in the storming of Molino del Rey and at Chapultepec, was Lieutenant Ulysses S. Grant, who had served with great credit in the army under Taylor, from the opening of the war through the siege of Monterey, and with Scott thus far in his campaign. Captains Robert Anderson, James Longstreet, and Lieutenant-Colonels Sumner, and Joseph E. Johnston, also obtained brevets for gallantry.
QUESTIONS. --6. What Is said of the fall of Molino del Rey and Chapultepec? When did the Americans enter the city of Mexico? -- What farther is said of Santa Anna?
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7. The fall of the
capital may be considered as closing this war. A treaty was
concluded, February 2, 
1848,
at Guadalupe Hidalgo, and peace was proclaimed by President
Polk the next 4th of July. By this treaty the United States gained
a vast expanse of territory, extending south to the River Gila and
west to the Pacific,1 and stipulated to pay Mexico
fifteen millions of dollars, and to assume her debts to American
citizens to the amount of over three millions more.
V. FROM
THE CLOSE OF THE WAR
WITH MEXICO TO THE
ACCESSION OF TAYLOR.
-- 1. The territory acquired from Mexico proved to be a
subject of contention. As early as August, 1846, when it
became
evident that the war would result in the acquisition of territory,
David Wilmot, a representative in Congress from Pennsylvania,
introduced a proposition, known as the Wilmot Proviso, by
which slavery was to be excluded from ail territory acquired of
Mexico. Although the proviso did not become a law, it brought the
subject of slavery before Congress and the people, for violent
debate, and still further strengthened the anti-slavery sentiment
in the north. The party opposed to the extension of slavery took
the name of the Free Soil party.2
2. A little before the conclusion of a
treaty with Mexico, gold was found to abound in
California.3 News of this discovery caused a
wonderful tide of emigration from all parts of the civilized world
to set towards the land of gold.
3.
In 1848 Wisconsin4 was admitted to the
Union.
Wisconsin, a part of the Territory of
Illinois,5 was attached to the Territory of
Michigan6 in 1818, and became a separate territory in
1836. As a territory it included a part of the Louisiana Purchase
north of
Missouri.7 Green Bay was founded in 1745, by the
French, who had, many years before, established a mission,
trading-post, and fort here, as well as at Prairie du Chien
and Le Pointe. French missionaries and traders explored
portions of Wisconsin as early as 1639.
1 The boundary between Mexico and the United States was to be the Rio Grande, from its mouth to New Mexico; thence to the River Gila; that river to its junction with the Colorado; thence in a straight line to the Pacific, at a point ten miles south of San Diego.
2 See p. 206, ¶ 12 3 See p. 214, ¶¶ 3, 4.
4 The state is named from the River Wisconsin. The name signifies "the gathering of the waters."
5 See p. 191, ¶ 2, and note 3.
6 See p. 200, ¶ 15. 7 See Iowa, p. 206, ¶ 13, and Minnesota, p. 225, ¶ 5.
QUESTIONS. -- 7. When and where was a treaty concluded? By this treaty what did the United States gain and what stipulate? V. 1. What is said of the territory acquired from Mexico? What is the Wilmot Proviso? What was the result of its introduction into Congress? What was the party opposed to the extension of slavery named? 2. What was found to abound in California? Effect of news of this discovery? 3. When was Wisconsin admitted to the Union? -- Give an account of the early history of Wisconsin.
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4. At the presidential
election in 1848, the Whig candidates, Zachary Taylor, of
Louisiana, for president, and Millard Fillmore, of New
York, for vice-president, were elected.
CHAPTER XI.
TAYLOR'S AND FILLMORE'S ADMINISTRATIONS.1 1894-1853.
1.
GENERAL TAYLOR found
the government surrounded by difficulties which threatened the
disruption of the Union. The questions relating to slavery
added the bitterness of sectional controversy to the strife of
party. 1st. The majority in the slave states contended that the
territory acquired from Mexico by the blood and treasure of
the whole Union should be open to the people of every section of
the country, with all their property, including slaveholders with
their slaves; and it was proposed to extend the line of the
Missouri Compromise2 to the Pacific, prohibiting
slavery north of the line, and permitting it south of it. In the
free states slavery was generally believed to be an evil and a
sin, and there was a large and growing party3 which,
although it had no disposition to molest the institution where it
already existed, would not consent to its extension to territory
then free, and such, by the laws of Mexico, was the condition of
the territory recently acquired. 2d. California formed a
constitution, and petitioned to be admitted to the Union as a free
state, with her Present boundaries. Since a part of this territory
extended
1 See Appendix, p. 21. 2 See p. 191, ¶ 3. 3 See p. 218, ¶ 1.
QUESTIONS. -- 4. Who were elected next president and vice-president? Chap. XI. 1. What the condition of the government on the accession of Taylor? How did sectional controversy arise in regard to territory acquired from Mexico? In regard to the admission of California?
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south of the proposed line of compromise, to
grant the petition would exclude slavery from a region into which
slaveholders maintained that they had a right to remove with their
slaves. 3d. Petitions had for years been pouring in upon Congress,
praying that the slave trade and slavery might be abolished in the
District of Columbia. 4th. The south had also found cause
of complaint in the fact that fugitive slaves had been assisted to
escape by people in the free states. 5th. To add to these sources
of sectional animosity, Texas set up a claim to a part of
the acquired territory, which, should it be allowed, would consign
to slavery the region claimed.
2. Under the lead of John C.
Calhoun,1 attempts were made to induce the people of
the south to accept no compromise on the sectional issues before
the country. The more violent urged secession from the Union and
the establishment of a Southern Confederacy,2 but more
moderate counsels prevailed.
3. In the midst of these dangers to the
republic, a committee3 was appointed in the United
States Senate 
to
devise a plan for the settlement of the difficulties. Henry
Clay,4 himself a slaveholder, but opposed to the
extension of slavery, was chairman, and in May, 1850, made a
report, embracing several measures, known as the Omnibus
Bill, and designed to arrange the subjects in dispute by
compromise.
4. Pending the discussions on Mr. Clay's
report, the nation was called a second time5 to mourn
the death of its chief magistrate. President Taylor died
July 9, 1850.
Called to his high station from a life of
active service in the camp, without any experience in the
administration of civil affairs, he had shown himself equal to the
position, and the confidence reposed in his integrity and
patriotism by the people of all sections of the country, caused
his death, at this time of national peril, to be felt as an
irreparable calamity.
5. Millard Fillmore, the
vice-president, now became president, and was inaugurated
the day after the death of General Taylor.
1 See p. 198, ¶ 9.
2 Henry S. Foote, at that time senator from Mississippi, is evidence that Calhoun prepared a constitution for such a confederacy.
3 The committee consisted of thirteen members. Besides the chairman, Mr. Clay, there were six from free and six from slave states.
4 See p. 199, ¶ 9. 5 See p. 203, ¶ 1.
QUESTIONS. -- How in regard to the District of Columbia? In regard to fugitive slaves? In regard to the claim set up by Texas? 2. What attempts were made under the lead of Mr. Calhoun? What was urged by the more violent? 3. For what purpose was a committee appointed in the United States Senate? Who was chairman of the committee? -- What bill did he report, and what did it embrace? 4. What melancholy event occurred during the discussions on Mr. Clay's report? -- What further is said of President Taylor? 5. Who now became president?
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The cabinet having
resigned, Mr. Fillmore nominated another, at the head of which, as
secretary of 
state,
was Daniel Webster,1 who, as United States senator, had
thrown the whole weight of his powerful influence in favor of Mr.
Clay's report.
6. The compromise measures reported by
Mr. Clay passed Congress, but not as a single bill, and received
the president's signature in September. They provided, 1st. For
the admission of California2 as a free state.
2d. For establishing the boundary of Texas, as at present,
and paying that state ten millions of dollars to relinquish all
claim to additional territory. 3d. For the organization of
territorial government in the remainder of the region
acquired from Mexico, without any provision for or against
slavery. 4th. For prohibiting the slave trade in the
District of Columbia; and, 5th For the enactment of a
Fugitive Slave Law, to enable masters to recover their
slaves escaping to a free state.
7. The fugitive slave law met with
great opposition in the north, and several instances of
its execution created intense excitement. In the south
a convention of disunionists met at Nashville for the purpose of
encouraging the slave states to secede; but before Fillmore
retired from the presidency, the people of both sections had
generally acquiesced in the compromise
measures.
8. In 1852, Franklin Pierce, of New
Hampshire, was elected president, and William Rufus
King,3 of Alabama, vice-president. They were the
candidates of the Democratic party, and friendly to the compromise
measures.
1 See p. 203, ¶ 2. 2 See p. 14, ¶5; p. 68, ¶ 2; p. 214, and p. 218, ¶¶ 7, and 2.
3 Mr. King never took his seat as president of the Senate. By special act of Congress the oath of office was administered to him in Cuba (whither he had gone for the benefit of his health) by the American consul-general at Havana. He died in April, 1853, soon after his return to Alabama.
QUESTIONS. -- Who was at the head of the new cabinet? 6. For what did Mr. Clay's compromise measures provide? When did they receive the president's signature? 7. What is said of the fugitive slave law? Of a convention of disunionists? Of the people of both sections before the close of the administration? 8. Who became the next president and vice-president?
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