Page:Vol 5 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/508

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488

INVASION OF THE VALLEY OF MEXICO.

for no organized resistance could have been offered; all was disorder among the soldiers as well as citizens.^[1]The American general returned most unconcernedly to the headquarters at Tlalpam, surrendering his advantages and giving Santa Anna time to recover himself. Scott explains his extraordinary conduct by saying that he, as well as Trist, "had been admonished by the best friends of peace against precipitation: lest by wantonly driving away the government and others, dishonored, he might scatter the elements of peace, excite a spirit of national desperation, and thus indefinitely postpone the hope of accommodation."^[2] He also pleads humane considerations, which, if sincere, are creditable enough to the man, but hardly to the general, in his precarious position, to sacrifice one tenth of his small force for an object of questionable value, and then, neglecting to secure the prize, to be compelled to do his work over again.

↑ 'Si el enemigo repite su ataque como yo lo esperaba, seguramente ocupa la capital sin mucha resistencia.' And Scott writes that after the Mexican army was beaten at Churubusco, 'the feebler defences at the gates of the city — four miles off — could not, as was well known to both parties, delay the victors an hour.' Report 32, in U. S. Govt Doc., Cong. 30, Ses. 1, Sen. Ex. 1, p. 380.
↑ Id., p. 314. He adds in his Mem., 498, an explanatory note that an assault on the city by day would have involved a loss 'dangerously great — which is contradictory to his official report — and by night the carnage among the citizens, their women and children, would have been frightful, as well as pillage, for the soldiers could not be controlled, and time could not be lost in making prisoners. Mansfield commends this christian magnanimity. Life Scott, 433-4; but Ripley, Semines, Kendall, Battles of Mex., and others, naturally condemn him from a military standpoint. Semmes claims for his favorite, Worth, the chief glory of the victory, by carrying the tête de pont, which led to the defeat of Santa Anna and the fall of the convent; but he also says that Worth called the halt at La Candelaria, when the city might have been carried by following up the advantage. Campaign, 290-1.

[1] 'Si el enemigo repite su ataque como yo lo esperaba, seguramente ocupa la capital sin mucha resistencia.' And Scott writes that after the Mexican army was beaten at Churubusco, 'the feebler defences at the gates of the city — four miles off — could not, as was well known to both parties, delay the victors an hour.' Report 32, in U. S. Govt Doc., Cong. 30, Ses. 1, Sen. Ex. 1, p. 380.

[2] Id., p. 314. He adds in his Mem., 498, an explanatory note that an assault on the city by day would have involved a loss 'dangerously great — which is contradictory to his official report — and by night the carnage among the citizens, their women and children, would have been frightful, as well as pillage, for the soldiers could not be controlled, and time could not be lost in making prisoners. Mansfield commends this christian magnanimity. Life Scott, 433-4; but Ripley, Semines, Kendall, Battles of Mex., and others, naturally condemn him from a military standpoint. Semmes claims for his favorite, Worth, the chief glory of the victory, by carrying the tête de pont, which led to the defeat of Santa Anna and the fall of the convent; but he also says that Worth called the halt at La Candelaria, when the city might have been carried by following up the advantage. Campaign, 290-1.

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