CONQUEST OF NEW MEXICO.

While the heaviest fighting was going on in Old Mexico, the Government easily took possession of New Mexico and California, by means of expeditions organized on the remote frontiers.

New Mexico was wanted for the emigration to the Pacific. If we were to have California we must also have the right of way to it. In the hands of the Spaniards, New Mexico barred access to the Pacific so completely that the oldest travelled route was scarcely known to Americans at all, and but little used by the Spaniards themselves.

If now we consult a map of the United States it is seen that the thirty-fourth parallel crosses the Mississippi at the mouth of the Arkansas, cuts New Mexico in the middle, and reaches the Pacific near Los Angeles. It was long the belief of statesmen that the great tide of emigration must set along this line, because it had the most temperate climate, was shorter, and would be found freer from hardship than the route by way of the South Pass. This view had set on foot the exploration of the Arkansas and Red rivers. But if we except the little that Pike and Long had gathered, almost nothing was known about it. Yet the prevailing belief gave New Mexico, as related to California, an exceptional importance.

These considerations weighed for more than acquisition of territory, though the notion that New Mexico contained very rich silver-mines undoubtedly had force in determining its conquest. Otherwise it was held to be a poor country, with little arable land, mostly mountainous, and scarcely fertile in the valleys, while in consequence of its great elevation the winters were severe.

Thus New Mexico seemed placed by Nature as a half-way house may stand alone at the summit of a mountain pass with deserts upon either side. It offered a place for the refreshment of the nation's travellers. At best it was only a thin wedge of semi-civilization driven north into barbarism as far as Spanish power could send it, but this force had spent itself long ago, and New Mexico now lay a stumbling-block in the path of progress, in contented isolation. Our Government determined to remove the obstruction.

With this object General Kearney marched from Fort Leavenworth in June, 1846, for Santa Fé, at the head of a force[1] of which a battalion of Mormons formed part. After subduing New Mexico, Kearney was to go on to California, and with the help of naval forces already sent there, for the purpose, conquer that country also.

It is worth while to dwell a moment upon one feature of this expedition, if only for its singularity. The Mormons were to be paid off in California, were to turn the sword into a ploughshare and settle in the country, and had therefore been allowed to take their families and property with them. They were seen when setting out on the march by Mr. Parkman, who thus describes them: "There was something very striking in the half-military, half-patriarchal appearance of these armed fanatics, thus on their way with their wives and children to found, it might be, a Mormon empire in California.

"In the morning the country was covered with mist. We were always early risers, but before we were ready the voices of men driving in the cattle sounded all around us. As we passed above their camp, we saw through the obscurity that the tents were falling, and the ranks rapidly forming; and, mingled with the cries of women and children, the rolling of the Mormon drums and the clear blast of their trumpets sounded through the mist.

"From that time to the journey's end, we met almost every day long trains of government wagons, laden with stores for the troops, crawling at a snail's pace towards Santa Fé."

General Kearney marched by the Upper Arkansas, to Bent's Fort,[2] and from Bent's Fort over the old trail through El Moro and Las Vegas, San Miguel and Old Pecos, without meeting the opposition he expected, or at any time seeing any considerable body of the enemy. On the 18th of August, as the sun was setting, the stars and stripes were unfurled over the palace of Santa Fé, and New Mexico was declared annexed[3] to the United States. Either the home government thought New Mexico quite safe from attack, or, having decided to reserve all its strength for the main conflict, had left this province to its fate.

After organizing a civil government, and appointing Charles Bent of Bent's Fort, governor, General Kearney broke up his camp at Santa Fé, Sept. 25. His force was now divided. One part, under Colonel Doniphan, was ordered to join General Wool in Chihuahua. A second detachment was left to garrison Santa Fé, while Kearney went on to California with the rest of the troops. The people everywhere seemed disposed to submit quietly, and as most of the pueblos soon proffered their allegiance to the United States Government, little fear of an outbreak[4] was felt.

Before leaving the valley, a courier was met bearing the news that California also had submitted to us without striking a blow. This information decided General Kearney to send back most of his remaining force, while with a few soldiers only he continued his march through what is now Arizona for the Pacific.

Near his point of departure from the Rio Grande, a deputation of the Apaches came to have a talk with the general. These hereditary foes of the Spaniards were lost in wonder at seeing the order and celerity with which our cavalry obeyed the bugle-call of "boots and saddles,"—the order to mount for the march. The pent-up wrath of three hundred years broke forth among them in hot words. "You have taken New Mexico, and will soon take California," they said. "Go, then, and take Chihuahua, Durango, and Sonora. You fight for land. We care nothing for land. We fight for the laws of Montezuma and for food. The Mexicans are rascals, and we will kill them all!"

Leaving this force to make its slow way down the Gila, and across the sandy desert of Lower California, we will now inquire what had happened to wrest California from Spanish rule without bloodshed.