Volume Iii Part 6 (1/2)
Fondness for a military life is natural in a man born and bred as he was, living in a country where the vicinity of the Indians made every man a Quaker or a soldier.
About 1808, volunteers were raised in the West to oppose the expected movements of Aaron Burr, a traitor to his country, a bold, bad man, who had been the candidate of the federalists for the Presidency; perhaps the worst man we had had in politics up to that time. Mr. Taylor joined one of the companies of volunteers. In 1808 he was appointed Lieutenant in the army of the United States, joined the forces, was soon sent to New Orleans, was seized with the yellow fever, and returned home.
In 1810 he was married to Miss Margaret Smith, of Maryland.
In 1811 he was employed in expeditions against the Indians in the Northwest of the United States. Here he was under the command of General Harrison.
In 1812 he was made Captain, and had the command of a block-house and stockade called Fort Harrison, on the Wabash river, soon after the declaration of war against England. This place was attacked by a strong body of Indians. Captain Taylor with less than fifty men, defended it with vigor and success. In consequence of his services on that occasion, he was promoted to the rank of Brevet Major. During the rest of the war, he continued in service on the frontiers, and seems to have done his duty faithfully as a soldier.
After the war was over, in 1815, the army was diminished to a peace establishment, and Major Taylor reduced to the rank of Captain. In consequence of this, he withdrew from the army, but, after a few months, returned, and was then, or subsequently, restored to his former rank as Major. For several years he was employed in such various military services, in the west and south-west, as must be performed in a time of peace. In 1819 he was made Lieutenant-Colonel. In 1832 he became Colonel, and in that year, with a command of four hundred men, he served under General Atkinson, in the expedition against the Sacs and other Indians led by the celebrated Black Hawk. Afterwards he was intrusted with the command of Fort Crawford, where he remained till 1836, when he was ordered to Florida, to fight against the Seminole Indians.
It was here that he made use of the bloodhounds to hunt the poor savages from their hiding-places in the woods. You know what Mr. Pitt once said of the Spanish use of this weapon in the sixteenth century, but the animals imported from Cuba, where they had been trained to hunt runaway slaves, were of no value when put upon the track of red men. I do not know who originated the scheme of employing the bloodhounds. It has often been ascribed to General Taylor, and with good reason, I believe, has it been denied that he was the author of that plan. It was of no great honor to the nation, let who would invent it; and few men will be sorry that it did not turn out well.
It was thought Colonel Taylor displayed a good deal of skill, in contending with the Indians in Florida, and, accordingly, he was made Brevet Brigadier-General, in 1838. After finis.h.i.+ng the conquest of the Indians, he left Florida, in 1840. It is said that fighting against the Indians is a good school for a soldier. General Taylor served long at this work, and served faithfully. In the Florida war, his conduct as General is said to have been n.o.ble.
In 1840, he was made Commander of that portion of the American army in the south-west of the United States, and in 1841, removed his family from Kentucky to Baton Rouge, in Louisiana, which has since been his home. In 1845 he was ordered to Texas, and had command of the ”Army of Occupation,” and subsequently of the ”Army of Invasion.” In the war against Mexico, it is thought by competent judges that he displayed a good deal of military skill. He was beloved by his soldiers, and seems to have won their confidence, partly by success, partly by military talent, but also in part by his character, which was frank, honest, just and unpretending. I have heard of no instance in the whole war, in which cruelty is chargeable upon him. Several anecdotes are related of his kindliness, generosity, and openness of heart. No doubt they are true.
War is a b.l.o.o.d.y trade; it makes one shudder to think of it in its terrible details; but the soldier is not necessarily a malignant or a cruel man; that b.l.o.o.d.y and profane command, so well known, uttered in the heat of conflict, when the battle seemed to waver, does not imply any peculiar cruelty or ill-will. It is only one of the accidents of war, which shows more clearly what its substance is.
I am no judge of warlike operations and of military skill, and therefore shall not pretend to pa.s.s judgment on matters which I know I do not understand; I shall not inquire as to the military value of the laurels he won at Resaca de la Palma, at Monterey, and at Buena Vista. But, in our judgment, we ought to remember one circ.u.mstance: that is, the inferiority of the Mexicans. They were beaten, I think, in every considerable battle throughout the whole war; no matter who commanded.
General Scott landed at Vera Cruz, captured the city, and the far-famed Castle of St. Juan d'Ulloa, garrisoned by four thousand three hundred and ninety soldiers, and the American loss amounted to thirteen men killed, and sixty-three hurt! General Scott took possession of the great port of the nation, with less than twenty thousand soldiers, with only about fifteen thousand troops; marched nearly two hundred miles into the interior, fighting his way, and garrisoning the road behind him, sometimes even subsisting his army in the country which he conquered as he went on; and finally took the capital, a city with nearly two hundred thousand inhabitants, with less than six thousand soldiers. Suppose an army of that size were to land at Newburyport, with the intention of marching to Worcester, not two hundred miles, but only fifty or sixty, how many do you think would ever reach the spot? Why, suppose the American men did nothing, there are women enough in Ma.s.sachusetts to throw every soldier into the Merrimac!
I do not believe that this inferiority of the Mexican arises so much from the superior bravery of the Americans; almost any male animal will fight on small provocation; your Mexican male, as well as your American, on as small provocation, and as desperately. But the American soldier was always well armed, furnished with every thing that modern science makes terrible in war; well clad, well fed, well paid, he went voluntarily to the work. The Mexicans were ill armed, ill clad, ill fed, often not paid at all, and sometimes brought to fight against their will.
The difference does not end here: the main reliance of the Mexican government, the regular soldiers, the Presidiales, were men who seemed to have most of the vices of old garrison soldiers, with most of the faults of new recruits; or, as another has said, himself a soldier in the war, ”All the vices engendered in a garrison life; all the cowardice which their constant defeats by the Indians had created; all the laziness contracted in an idle monotonous existence, and very little military skill.” The new levies came unwillingly, and were often only ”food for powder.” On the American side was a small body of veteran soldiers, low and coa.r.s.e men--it is the policy of America to have the rank and file of our army in peace composed usually of such--but full of brute courage; accustomed to all sorts of hards.h.i.+ps and exposure; under a discipline rigorous and almost perfect; wonted to danger, and weaned from fear; careless of life almost to desperation; full of confidence in their commander, and of contempt for their foe. The volunteers brought with them the characteristic ardor of Americans, their confidence of success, their contempt of toil and of danger; familiar with fire-arms from their youth, they soon learned the discipline of the camp.
You see what a difference this makes between the two armies; but the chief superiority of the American soldiers was this--they came from a country where there is a complete national unity of action. So the government could trust the army, and the army the government; the soldiers had confidence in their commander, confidence in their country, confidence in their cause; while the Mexicans had no national unity of action, the people little confidence in the government, the government as little in the people; the nation but little trust in the army, and the army little in the nation; the soldiers had great fear of the enemy, little faith in their officers, and the officers little in their men.
Did you ever see a swarm of bees when the queen bee was dead, and moths had invaded the hive? The Mexicans were much in the same state. The result was what had readily been foreseen: at the battle of Buena Vista, on the one side, there were twenty-one thousand five hundred and fifty-three Mexicans; on the other, four thousand seven hundred and fifty-nine American soldiers, of which only four hundred and seventy-six were regulars. Yet the American loss, in killed, wounded and missing, was but seven hundred and forty-six, while that of the Mexican army was nearly two thousand men lost. If the Mexicans had done the same proportionate execution, every American would have been killed long before night.
All these things ought to be taken into account, in making up our mind about the difficulty of the enterprise. Still, after this allowance is made, it must be confessed the American invasion of Mexico was a remarkable undertaking, distinguished for its boldness, not to say its rashness, and almost unparalleled in the history of modern wars. It certainly did require great coolness, courage, and prudence, on the part of General Taylor, to conduct his part of the expedition. He had those qualities, but it has not yet been proved or shown to be probable, that he had the n.o.bler qualities which make a great General. The kind of warfare he was engaged in, does not bring to light the high qualities of a man like Gustavus Adolphus, Frederick the Great, or Napoleon. Perhaps General Taylor had them, but they did not appear.
The Mexican war was unfortunate for the administration which carried it on, for the political party which caused the war. The success of General Taylor attracted the attention of the people, and the obscure soldier took popular rank before the President of the United States.
Unconsciously the vicarious suitor, courting public favor for his master, won good graces for himself. The political party which began the war, was eclipsed by the triumph of its own soldier; and the slave-power which projected the war seems likely to be ruined by the success of the enterprise.
It has been said, that he was averse to the Mexican war which he fought in; I know not whether this be true or false. But if true, it deserves to be remembered in his defence, that the soldier is only an active tool, as much the instrument of his employer as the spade of the workman whose foot crowds it into the ground. The soldier, high or low, must obey the men who have the official right to command him, his free-will merging in that of his superior. If General Taylor had thought the Mexican war unjust and wicked, and in consequence had resigned his commission, he would have been covered with obloquy and contempt in the eyes of military men, and the officials of government. Most of the newspapers of the land would have attacked him, called him a coward, a traitor and a fanatic; their condemnation would have been worth as much as their praise is now. In estimating his character we ought to remember this fact, for few men do more than their office demands of them, or more than public opinion can approve.
Such was the success of General Taylor in war, at the head of a few thousand men, that public attention was turned towards him, and in a few months the obscure frontier soldier was the most prominent man in the nation. In 1848 he received the nomination of the Whig Convention at Philadelphia, for President, and in due time was elected.
His election was certainly one of the most remarkable that ever took place in America. It is worth while to look at it for a moment. There was nothing very remarkable in the man to ent.i.tle him to that eminent distinction; if there were, the nation was very slow in finding it out.
He was a farmer till about twenty-four years old; then a common Lieutenant four years more. In the next twenty years he got no higher than to the rank of a ”Frontier Colonel;” he attained that dignity in fact, at the age of forty-eight. He was not made General till the fifty-fifth year of his age. But for the Mexican war, I suppose he would, at this day, be as obscure as any other General in the United States' army; n.o.body would think he was the ”Second Was.h.i.+ngton,” ”first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen,” as his creatures have declared. Other military men have been chosen to the presidency. But Was.h.i.+ngton was much more than a soldier; in ”a time that tried men's souls” to the utmost, he had carried the nation through eight years of most perilous warfare, more by his character than any eminent military skill, and so had become endeared to the hearts of the people as no American had ever been before. General Jackson, at first educated as a lawyer, was a man of large talents, distinguished as a Governor, as a Senator, and as a Judge of the Supreme Court of Tennessee, before he was elected President, or nominated for that office. General Harrison, a man of small abilities, surely not more than a third-rate politician in Ohio, was yet familiar with the routine of political affairs. He had been a member of the Legislature of Ohio, of both branches of the Congress of the United States, and Minister to Colombia. General Taylor, with an education very imperfect, had pa.s.sed his life, from twenty-four to sixty-four, on the frontiers and in the army; had never held any civil office; had seldom voted, and though an excellent officer in the sphere of duty he had occupied, did not appear to be the most promising man in the nation to select for its highest and most difficult office. The defence of a log-house in 1812 against a troop of Indians, the conquest of Black Hawk, the rout of the Seminoles, the gaining of half-a-dozen battles in Mexico, at the head of a few thousand soldiers, does not seem exactly an adequate schooling to prepare a common man to lead and rule twenty million Americans with the most complicated government in the world. It certainly was surprising, that he should be nominated for that office; and more so, that the nomination should be confirmed by the people. It is not surprising, that the distinguished Senator of Ma.s.sachusetts should call this ”A nomination not fit to be made;” the wonder is, he deemed it fit to be confirmed. In selecting him for our chief, the nation went hap-hazard, and made a leap in the dark. No prudent man in Boston would hire a cook or a coachman with such inadequate recommendations as General Taylor had to prove his fitness for his place. Had a sensible man on election day asked the nation, ”What do you know about the man you vote for?” the people would have been sadly puzzled to seek for an answer. The reasons which led to his selection were partly special, and partly of a general and popular character. It is instructive for us to look at them, now that we can do it coolly.
I suppose this was the special cause of his nomination: The leaders of the whig party thought they could not elect either of their most prominent men. If they went before the people with nothing but their idea,--The protection of property by a tariff, and a Representative of that idea, however able and well trained, they feared defeat; such as they had met with in the last campaign, when the democratic party, with a man almost unknown to the people, a tricky lawyer from Tennessee, had yet carried the day against one of the oldest and ablest politicians in the country. So the whig leaders availed themselves of the temporary popularity of a successful General to give an accidental triumph to their party, and apparently to their idea. That I think was the specific reason which led the politicians to nominate him. Doubtless there were other private reasons, weighty to certain individuals, that need not be touched upon.
But the general reasons, which gave him weight with the ma.s.s of the people and secured his election, ought to be stated for our serious reflection.
1. There was no one of the great leaders of either party whom the people had much confidence in. I am sorry to say so, but I do not think there is much in any of them to command the respect of a nation, and make us swear fealty to those men. There were two candidates of the whig party; from one of them you might expect a compromise; from the other you were not certain even of that. The democratic candidate had not a name to conjure with. The free soil candidate--was he a man to trust in such times as these? Did you see your king and chief in any one of those four men? Was any one of them fit to be the political schoolmaster of this nation? What ”ground and lofty tumbling” have we had from all four of them?
2. General Taylor was not mixed up with the grand or petty intrigues of the parties, their quarrels and struggles for office. Men knew little about him; if little good, certainly little not good; little evil in comparison with any of the others. Sometimes you take a man whom you do not know, in preference to an old acquaintance whom you have known too long and too well to trust.
3. Then General Taylor had shown himself a rough, honest, plain, straight-forward man, and withal mild and good-natured. Apparently, there was much in him to attract and deserve the good-will of the nation. His likeness went abroad through the country like a proclamation; it was the rude, manly, firm, honest, good-natured, homely face of a backwoodsman. His plain habits, plain talk, and modest demeanor reminded men of the old English ballad of ”The King and the Miller” and the like, and won the affections of honest men. I doubt not the fact that General Harrison had once lived in a log cabin, and, other things failing, did drink ”hard cider,” gave him thousands of votes. The candidate was called ”Old Rough and Ready,” and there was not a clown in field or city but could understand all that was meant by those terms.