In September 1845, Grant's Fourth Infantry Regiment went
to war. Although the army, under the command of General Zachary
Taylor, was officially only an army of observation designed to
ensure the uneventful annexation of Texas, few doubted that the
army would soon become active militarily. As Grant later wrote,
"We were sent to provoke a fight, but it was essential that Mexico
should commence it." In fact, in September the army boarded ships
in Louisiana and sailed for Corpus Christi, Texas, where it became
an army of occupation. The three thousand soldiers set up a neat
camp outside the town, and Grant participated in the plays directed
by his West Point friend James Longstreet–who went on to become
the second- in-command of the Confederate Army in the Civil War.
When the presence of the U.S. Army in Corpus Christi failed
to entice the Mexican army to battle, Taylor marched his army 150 miles
to the Texas border at the Rio Grande. Grant, for one, did not support
the American approach, later commenting that he felt the resulting
war was one of the most "unjust" ever waged.
On May 3, 1846, the Americans got the war they came for.
Mexican General Mariano Arista opened fire on the American positions with
artillery. Grant, twenty-five miles away on the coast, could hear
the gunfire and "felt sorry" he had enlisted. As he returned to the
beleaguered force, he and the rest of Taylor's army met a large Mexican
force–Grant's first experience in battle. The Mexicans, although
superior in number, found themselves hopelessly outgunned by the
American howitzers, which tore large holes in the Mexican ranks.
Grant escaped from the encounter unharmed, although he saw his
first man die in combat when a cannon shell exploded nearby, killing
one and injuring Grant's captain.
Grant's accounts of the incidents, and later his accounts
of dozen more battles, were always matter-of-fact, devoid of emotion, recording
only the incident and never his thoughts. The next day, Grant went
again into battle, near Resaca de la Palma, although as a quartermaster
he was meant to stay away from the front lines. However, he found
a clear area with several Mexican soldiers and charged his company
across the field, meeting no resistance. The battle ultimately drove
the Mexicans back across the Rio Grande, and the next day Taylor
crossed the river with his own army and seized Matamoros.
In August 1846, Taylor made a move towards Monterrey,
the largest city in the area. The heat forced the army to travel
at night and contributed to a general lethargy among the pack animals–which
became Grant's problem as quartermaster. His treatment of the situation
underscored one of his character traits, that he never is known
to have uttered an expletive: "I am not aware of ever having used
a profane expletive in my life; but I would have the charity to
excuse those who have done so, if they were in charge of a train
of Mexican pack animals at the time." As with everything else,
Grant approached the pack animals as detached and emotionless,
not allowing himself to get worked up enough to curse.
At Monterrey, Grant participated in the attack on the
Black Fort, the city's main defense. Almost a third of the American
force was killed or wounded in the first assault, and the Army
regrouped at a different location. Grant, who had commandeered
a horse for the first charge, offered it to another officer and
grabbed another mount from his quartermaster contingent. In the
second charge, the first officer was killed, and Grant–as the only
other mounted officer–became the new commander for the detachment.
Grant and his troops fought a house-to-house battle through the
city, and the entire force took heavy losses. A negotiated peace
allowed the Mexicans to retreat from the city with their weapons,
much to Taylor's chagrin.
Nonetheless, the battle had been enough of a success to
boost Taylor's fame across the country, and he began to be talked
about as a possible Presidential candidate. The other main general
in the army, Winfield Scott–who considered himself a better politician–began
to protest that he too needed to be involved in the war. What had
started out as a political war was now in danger of being completely
bogged down in internal bickering.
When Scott finally got the go-ahead in March 1847, he
moved his army to Veracruz and marched on Mexico City. Grant's
unit went to Veracruz to assist. Scott, outnumbered by the Mexican army,
left Veracruz without waiting for a supply line and marched for
the capital city–a tactic that Grant would later use at Vicksburg. When
peace negotiations failed, Scott's army fought two deadly battles
at Chapultepec and Molino del Rey. At San Cosme, Grant earned his
own note of the battle when he led a group of troops to capture
a church and mount a cannon in the belfry where it could fire on
distant Mexican troops–the incident even earned a brief mention
in the dispatches to Washington. The U.S. Army won the day handily,
and Mexico arraigned to transfer Texas, New Mexico, and California
to the U.S. for fifteen million dollars. While Grant's own role
in the war was remarkably uneventful, his first experience taught
him much about leadership, command, and military tactics. He would
ultimately follow some of Scott's tactics and later adopted Taylor's
unpretentious dress during the Civil War.
Grant remained in Mexico for several months, enjoying
the sights, learning Spanish, hiking, and exploring. He loved the
country and was surprised by the lack of resentment he felt from
its people. He wrote Julia often, waxing about the beauty of the
area. However, when orders came to return to the U.S., Grant happily
set out to reunite with his love. After a promotion to Brevet Captain, Grant
was returned to base in St. Louis.
