The Journal of San Diego History
SAN DIEGO HISTORICAL SOCIETY QUARTERLY
Winter 1984, Volume 30, Number 1
Thomas L. Scharf, Managing Editor

by Richard W. Amero
La Siesta Press La Frontera Award
San Diego Historical Society 1983 Institute of History

Images from this article

Most historians of the Mexican-American War (1846-1848) spend  hours describing the invasion of Mexico and minutes summarizing events in Alta California.1 This neglect is explainable for the Baja California expedition was neither costly nor bloody and its outcome had no effect upon the conclusion of the war. Naval historians give the Baja California incursion more attention than general historians because the conflict of the war sheds light on the characters of naval commanders and reveals the weaknesses of an over-extended, under-supported naval operation.2

During the Baja California engagement, statesmen and military commanders promised the rights of United States’ citizens to Baja California inhabitants only to withdraw this promise when it became impractical to keep it. On a personal note, rowdy and impressionable recruits played, made love and fought in a land of contrasts: of mountainous deserts, filled with volcanic rocks, narrow canyons and towering cacti, and of green coastal strips, beautified with pristine beaches, slender palms and white-washed towns.

On April 24, 1846, Mexican forces fired on United States soldiers occupying land between the Rio Grande and the Nueces River claimed by both the United States and Mexico. Responding to this attack, President James Knox Polk, on May 11, asked Congress to acknowledge that a state of war existed “by the act of Mexico herself.”3 Two days later Polk signed the war bill.

As the United States had long sought but failed to acquire New Mexico and Alta California through purchase, persuasion and subversion, the Rio Grande incident offered an excuse for acquisition by force. To this end, on May 30, the Cabinet agreed to the President’s proposal to name General Stephen Watts Kearny commander of an overland expedition to California. Secretary of War William L. Marcy took the next step toward California, on June 26, when he authorized Jonathan R. Stevenson, a colonel of militia, to raise a regiment of volunteers in New York State to join Kearny’s command in California.

In July and August, successive Commodores of the Pacific Squadron, John Drake Sloat and Robert F. Stoclcton, established United States control of the Pacific coast from San Francisco to San Diego. On August 17, Stockton proclaimed: “having by right of conquest taken possession of that territory known by the name of Upper and Lower California (I) do now declare it to be a territory of the United States under the name of the Territory of California.”4 As his statement indicates, Stockton was often subject to overstating facts. To carry out his plans, on August 19, Stockton ordered Samuel F. Du Pont, commander of the second-class sloop-of-war Cyane, to blockade San Blas and Joseph B. Hull, commander of the second-class sloop-of-war Warren, to blockade Mazatlán. Stockton’s aim was to seize Acapulco and use it as a point from which to send recruits to invade Mexico.

On September 2, the Cyane captured two Mexican vessels at San Blas. Five days later the Warren seized the Mexican brig Malek Adhel at Mazatlán. While stopping at La Paz, on the southeast corner of Baja California, and San José del Cabo, at the peninsula’s southern tip, Commander Du Pont secured a promise of neutrality from Colonel Francisco Palacios Miranda, governor of Baja California. On October 1, the Cyane seized two schooners at Loreto, about 150 miles north of La Paz, and, on October 7, cannonaded Guaymas on the mainland. In October, the Warren left for San Francisco. The Cyane soon followed. The first blockade of Mexico’s west coast had lasted about four weeks. It took place during the tropical cyclone season. The blockade was ineffective because the need for supplies prevented the Cyane and the Warren from remaining in position and because the demands of the Alta California campaign made it impossible to send replacement ships.

On November 5, Secretary of the Navy John Y. Mason informed Stockton California would be retained.5 On January 11, 1847, Secretary of War Marcy instructed General Kearny “to make the conquest of the Californias so effective that no successful challenge could be placed against it.” 6

Unaware his replacement, Commodore W. Branford Shubrick, had arrived in Monterey on January 22, Stockton on February 2 ordered Commander John B. Montgomery on the first-class sloop-of-war Portsmouth to reestablish the blockade at Mazatlán and to raise the United States flag at San José del Cabo, La Paz, Pichilinque and Loreto. Montgomery imposed the blockade at Mazatlán on February 17. In late March, he sailed for Baja California to complete his second mission. On April 14, Colonel Miranda surrendered La Paz. Soon after, a committee of residents signed articles of capitulation which granted them United States citizens’ rights and the retention of their own officials and laws.

On February 15, a council meeting at Santa Anita, about 20 miles north of San José del Cabo, declared Miranda a traitor and named Mauricio Castro, a native of San José del Cabo, as his successor.7Castro tried to raise a company of volunteers without success.

Acting under blockade instructions issued by Commodore James Biddle, who was head of the Pacific squadron from March 2 to July 19, the Cyane, a second-class sloop-of-war, and the Independence, a ship-of-the-line that had been cut down or razeed into a frigate, relieved the Portsmouth, which returned to Monterey, and resumed the Mazatlán blockade on April 27. Commodore Shubrick, now junior to Commodore Biddle, was on board the Independence. When the Independence left for San Francisco on June 3, the Cyane was the only United States warship left on the western coast of Mexico. To provide the friendly inhabitants of La Paz and San José del Cabo with a semblance of protection, Commander Du Pont sailed the Cyane back and forth between San José and Mazatlán which technically broke the blockade. Upon meeting the Cyane at San José on June 20, Commander Montgomery, on board the Portsmouth, became aware that Mazatlán was open to commerce. After discussing the matter with Commander Du Pont, Montgomery returned to San Francisco for instructions on June 28 and the Cyane left to resupply in Hawaii.8 The second blockade had been as ineffective as the first.

Without ships and troops the United States could not protect friendly natives nor suppress unfriendly ones. In March and April, the New York Volunteers arrived in Yerba Buena (now San Francisco) after having completed an ocean voyage around Cape Horn. On May 30, General Kearny, acting under instructions from Secretary of War Marcy which he received on April 23, directed Lieutenant Colonel Henry S. Burton, U.S. Army, and Companies A and B of the First Regiment of the New York Volunteers to embark on the storeship Lexington for La Paz. Burton’s orders were to hoist the flag in Baja California, to take possession, and to assert and uphold United States’ civil jurisdiction.9

On July 21, 115 New York Volunteers landed peacefully at La Paz. Lieutenant E. Gould Buffum, Company B, was surprised to find the prettiest town he had seen in California: “The houses were all of adobe, plastered white, and thatched with the leaves of the palm tree, and were most delightfully cool. The whole beach was lined with palms, date, fig, tamarind and coconut trees, their delicious fruit hanging down on them in clusters.”10

Burton reinstated the civil government on condition it remain loyal to the United States. The residents of La Paz entertained the Volunteers. To the north, at Loreto, about 150 miles up the coast, and at Mulegé, about 100 miles further up the coast, Padre Gabriel González of Todos Santos and Padre Vicente Sotomayor of Comondú incited ranchers to resistance. In late September, Don Manuel Pineda, a captain in the Mexican army, arrived in Mulegé with a band of officers and supplies from Guaymas and began recruiting the ranchers.

On August 10, Commodore Shubrick, who had resumed command of the Pacific squadron, sent third-class sloop Dale, first-class sloop Portsmouth and first-class frigate Congress to commence a new blockade of Mazatlán, Guaymas and San Blas. When the Dale arrived at La Paz in mid-September, Colonel Burton persuaded her commander, Thomas O’Selfridge, to sail for Loreto and Mulegé to prevent the landing of supplies from Guaymas and to secure a pledge of neutrality from the inhabitants. On September 30, the Dale ran in at Mulegé under English colors. After it was anchored, it lowered that flag and raised the Stars and Stripes. Lieutenant Tunis Augustus Macdonough Craven, U.S. Navy, tried to go ashore, but was prevented by a party of Mexicans. He then suggested boats seize the schooner Magdalena, which lay in anchor. Craven and fifty men in four boats rowed to the schooner and towed her out to the Dale. After they discovered her bottom was full of holes, they fired their prize.11

On October 1, Commander Selfridge sent a letter ashore warning the authorities to lay down their arms, to preserve neutrality, and to abstain from contact with the mainland. In his reply, Captain Pineda refused to be neutral, protested against the Dale’s use of English colors to enter the port, and boasted he would recapture La Paz.12

Pineda’s defiance did not go unanswered. Early in the afternoon, Craven and seventeen marines and fifty-seven sailors clambered into boats and rowed up a creek that led to the pueblo. The party landed on the creek’s right bank and exchanged gunfire with Pineda’s men who occupied the left bank. In late afternoon, Craven’s patrol returned to the Dale. There were no casualties on either side and because the sailors and marines had failed to take Mulegé, this skirmish marked their first failure in the peninsula war.13

Commerce between Guaymas and Mulegé continued in spite of harassment by the Libertad, a schooner chartered from Captain Peter Davis, a United States citizen at La Paz, and commanded by Lieutenant Craven. On October 20, Captain Elie A. F. La Vallette of the first-class frigate Congress forced the Mexican garrison to evacuate Guaymas. On November 10, Lieutenant Craven and his crew of eleven captured the sloop Alerta, about twenty-five miles north of Mulegé.

Pineda and his fellow officers alienated most of the local population by pressing men into service, by requisitioning supplies, and by plundering the property of collaborators. Patriots at San José del Cabo, on October 23, declared United States rule at an end; however the arrival of the Cyane, Congress and Independence, five days later, convinced the patriots that discretion was the better part of valor. Upon learning insurrectionary activity was taking place at Todos Santos, about 90 miles away on the Pacific coast, Commodore Shubrick sent Lieutenant Montgomery Lewis, U.S. Navy; Lieutenant Henry W. Halleck, U.S. Army, and thirty seamen to investigate. To Lieutenant Halleck the highlight of the trip was his meeting with five Mexican girls at a small ranch outside Todos Santos.

“Wearing dresses without sleeves and low in the bosom, like our belles at home when they wish to display their charms in the ballroom, and being too poor to afford rebosas with which Mexican ladies usually conceal their budding beauties, these belles of Pescadero in their simple calico robes, without the wild grass, cotton, bran or whalebone, presented us as lovely figures as the eye could ever wish to gaze upon.”14

At the mission in Todos Santos, Padre Gabriel González, president of the Dominican missions in Baja California and owner of a huge ranch, plied the marines with rum and soft talk while he secretly sent a message to Pineda’s insurgents, some thirty miles away, advising them to ambush the marines on their way back to San José.15

Lieutenant Lewis’ party returned on November 7 without meeting Pineda’s forces. Unknown to Lieutenant Lewis, Pineda was about to attack La Paz and San José del Cabo.

Before leaving with the Pacific squadron to capture Mazatlán, Commodore Shubrick proclaimed on November 4: “the flag of the United States is destined to wave forever over the Californias. No contingency can be seen in which the United States will ever surrender or relinquish the possession of the Californias.”16 Shubrick left Lieutenant Charles Heywood, four passed midshipmen and twenty marines, along with a 9-pounder carronade and seventy-five carbines, to hold San José. The small contingent occupied a cuartel or barracks in an old mission on a rise of land at the north end of town.

On November 11, the Pacific squadron gained Mazatlán without firing a shot. On November 16, Pineda’s forces, estimated by Colonel Burton at nearly 300,17 attacked the U.S. Army garrison at La Paz. Burton’s command of 112 men occupied a position overlooking La Paz at the south side of a gulch. The Volunteers piled palm logs around their adobe barracks and around an emplacement for their two 6-pound field pieces. The 6-pounders poured a fire of canister upon the enemy. On November 17, the Mexicans withdrew to La Laguna, about six miles away. Before leaving, the insurgents burned Governor Miranda’s town house. The Volunteers lost one man in this battle, the Mexicans four or five.18

At the same time Pineda launched his attack on La Paz, he sent a force, given by Halleck as 150,19 and led by three of his lieutenants, to attack Heywood’s force of twenty-five sailors and marines and twenty California volunteers stationed at the cuartel in San José del Cabo.20 On November 19, Heywood refused a demand to surrender. The next night one of his men shot Lieutenant José Antonio Mijares as the latter charged the cuartel in an attempt to capture the 9-pounder. (For his brave deed, the Mexicans consider Lieutenant Mijares a hero and have placed a monument in his honor on the main street of San José del Cabo, which is called Calle Mijares.) On November 21, two American whalers, the Magnolia and the Edward, appeared offshore. Believing the whalers to be naval ships the Mexicans withdrew. In this first assault at San José del Cabo, the Mexican loyalists acknowledged six killed, which number Heywood considered too small by half. None of Heywood’s men were killed.21

Upon hearing of the attack at San José del Cabo, Commodore Shubrick, on November 16, sent the storeship Southampton and the first-class sloop-of-war Portsmouth to reinforce Heywood’s men. The Southampton arrived on November 26 and the Portsmouth on December 3.

His forces having been increased by the company which had been repulsed at San José, Pineda, on November 27, led a second assault on La Paz. Burton gave the number of attackers as about 500.22 They advanced, under cover of ravines and cacti, toward the U.S. Army position, but were driven back by musket fire. On December 8, a launch sent to the American fleet at Mazatlán on November 21 by Colonel Burton, arrived back at La Paz with provisions and ammunition. On the same day, the Cyane, under Commodore Shubrick’s orders, arrived from San Blas and lifted the siege.

While the number of Mexican casualties during the second attack on La Paz is not known, Burton reported finding thirty-six graves.23 No Americans had been killed. Lieutenant Craven described the appearance of the ruined town:

“All of that part of the town not protected by the garrison’s muskets was burned, the vine and fig tree as well as the graceful palm-all being devoured. Such are the beauties of war.”24

While the Mexicans were besieging La Paz, President Polk, in his annual message to the United States Congress, on December 7, 1847, stated:

“Early after the commencement of the war, New Mexico and the Californias were taken possession by our forces. Our military and naval commanders were ordered to conquer and to hold them, subject to be disposed of by a treaty of peace. These Provinces are now in our undisputed occupation and have been so for many months, all resistance on the part of Mexico having ceased within their limits. . . . I am satisfied that they should never be surrendered to Mexico.”25

Upon hearing of the president’s assertion that the United States was in quiet possession of the Californias, Commander Du Pont told Colonel Burton: “he ought to feel very grateful for this news, for as he rarely sleeps at night, he may take a good night’s snooze on the strength of it. “26

On January 12, 1848, Lieutenant Frederick Chatard of the bark Whiton removed the fortress guns from San Blas. Six days later Lieutenant Chatard spiked three guns at Manzanillo. The only guns Mexico had left along the Pacific coast were about 300 miles southeastward at Acapulco.

Soon after the Portsmouth joined her at San José del Cabo, the Southampton returned to Mazatlán. When the Portsmouth left for the east coast, January 4, 1848, the American post at San José was once more without naval support. Heywood’s garrison consisted of twenty-seven marines, sixteen seamen volunteers, twenty California volunteers, three field-pieces and a supply of ammunition.27

On January 22, the insurgents seized eight of Heywood’s men who were hauling supplies left by a schooner from the beach to the cuartel. About 300 loyalists and a number of Vaqui Indians besieged Heywood’s camp. Nearly fifty women and children, who had fled to the cuartel when fighting began, increased the hardship.28

By February 10, the loyalists held all San José del Cabo except the cuartel. On February 11, a Mexican rifleman shot Passed Midshipman Tenant McLanahan, Heywood’s second-in-command. The next day, the loyalists captured the garrison’s water supply. To the desperate company inside the camp, it seemed the only choices were starvation or surrender.

Upon hearing of the plight of the San José garrison, Shubrick ordered the Cyane to relieve the situation, On sundown of February 14, the Cyane reached San José. Next morning, 102 officers and men landed. The contingent advanced along a two-mile road near the hamlet of San Vicente, where the insurgents were waiting. Heywood and thirty of his men sallied from the cuartel to join their rescuers. As the Americans advanced and fired, the Mexicans retreated. During the 21-day siege, the Americans lost three men while the Mexicans lost from thirteen (Heywood)29 to thirty-five (Du Pont).30

With San José secured, Colonel Burton, on March 15, ordered a raid on Pineda’s headquarters at San Antonio, about thirty miles south of La Paz. At daylight on the following morning, Captain Seymour G. Steele, U.S. Army, and thirty-three mounted men charged the camp and drove off the enemy, killing three of their number.31 Pineda escaped in his night clothes.32 The Volunteers lost one man in the encounter, but rescued the eight men who had been captured at San José.

Captain (“Black Jack”) Henry Naglee and 114 recruits detached from Companies C and D of the First Regiment of the New York Volunteers arrived at La Paz on March 22 on the storeship Isabella. Colonel Burton could now move against the enemy without leaving La Paz open. On March 26, Burton and 217 men set out for Todos Santos, about fifty-five miles southwest on the Pacific coast.

William R. Ryan described the appearance of the cavalry at the beginning of the march:

“We had all sorts of costumes, some military, some Californian, some wearing a hybrid between the two, others habited after a fashion more decidely brigandish than anything else, but the majority of us appearing much the worse for our rough journey through the thorns, whilst many were literally in rags. “33

On March 27, the first day out, an advance party of fifteen captured Pineda at San Antonio. On March 30, as the expedition neared Todos Santos, Burton sent Captain Naglee and forty-five men to attack the enemy from the rear. Some 200 to 300 Mexicans and Vaqui Indians occupied a hill in the path of Burton’s advancing forces.34 When they fired on Burton’s men, Naglee’s company charged them from behind. Burton reported this engagement cost the Mexicans ten men, the Americans none.35

With Todos Santos secured, Burton sent Naglee and fifty men toward Magdalena Bay, about 150 miles northwest on the Pacific coast, to cut off the enemy’s retreat while he led the remaining soldiers back to La Paz, arriving April 7. With Burton were Pineda, six officers, and 103 noncommissioned officers and privates as prisoners.36

Naglee returned April 12 with five captives after having completed a march of 350 miles over narrow mule paths in pursuit of an elusive enemy. Within a mile of La Paz, he ordered the shooting of two prisoners-an Indian and a Californian-in violation of military orders. For this unlawful deed, Colonel Richard B. Mason, military governor of Alta California, ordered Naglee arrested; however he escaped punishment when President Polk granted a pardon to military and naval offenders acting in wartime.37

Around April 2, the civil authorities of Miraflores delivered Mauricio Castro, who had replaced Pineda as commander of the Mexican forces, to Lieutenant George L. Selden of the Cyane.

On April 29, Commander Du Pont wrote to Commodore Shubrick: “The country is completely quieted, and, from what I can learn and from personal observations, I am impressed with the belief that all men of substance and respectability would decidedly prefer the American government, and will be much mortified should the territory not be included in the treaty. “38

Ironically, the American successes at Todos Santos and in mopping-up operations came after the signing in Mexico City, on February 2, 1848, of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which did not allow United States possession of Baja California:

The idleness that followed the signing of the treaty made the New York Volunteers restless. Some objected to “Black Jack” Naglee’s stern discipline and harsh punishments. Most of them thought they should be released from military service at once. Mutinies among the Volunteers developed at San José del Cabo in April and at La Paz in June, which were quickly brought under control by marines from the Cyane and the Independence.

The fight for Baja California lasted eighteen months. During this time, President Polk, Commodores Stockton and Shubrick, and Commander Montgomery promised that Baja California would become part of the United States.

On April 12, 1848, Lieutenant Henry W. Halleck, U.S. Army, wrote to Colonel Richard B. Mason, governor of Alta California:

For the United States to voluntarily surrender this country to the Republic of Mexico, and leave these Californians exposed to the loss of life and confiscation of property for having sided with us, under the assurances . . . held out to them, would not only be itself a breach of national faith,but would make us appear in the eye of the world guilty of the most deliberate and cruel deception.”39

In early August, Lieutenant William Sherman, adjutant general to Governor Mason, ordered the New York Volunteers to return to Alta California to be discharged. The ship-of-the-line Ohio and second-class sloop Warren were assigned to act as troop transports and the storeship Southampton and second-class sloop Lexington as refugee transports. The Lexington had 130 refugees on board when it sailed from La Paz to Monterey.40 The Ohio left La Paz on September 1 and San José on September 6 with the last of the Volunteers and 350 refugees on board. 41 Among the refugees were María Mapara Ruíz, who later became Colonel Burton’s wife; Padre Ignacio Ramirez y Arollona, a Dominican priest and friend of the Americans; and ex-governor Francisco Palacios Miranda. Many Bajacalifornios who sided with the Americans stayed behind because they did not want to lose their land. The Ohio reached Monterey on October 9. The total number of Bajacalifornios who made the move is not known.

On October 24, Colonel Burton dismissed the three companies of New York Volunteers (A, B and D) which had been stationed in Baja California. On November 7, a total payment of $37,698 from a “military contributions fund” was made to those refugees who had sustained property damage as a result of military action. Meals and quarters costing $551.94 were furnished to refugees from October 1 to November 30.42 Several of the Mexican families who migrated to California and many of the Volunteers resettled around San Francisco. A few of the Volunteers eventually returned to Baja California, married local women and became Mexican citizens.

Looking back over the American withdrawal from Baja California, ex-Lieutenant E. Gould Buffum wrote:

“Never in the history of wars among civilized nations was there a greater piece of injustice committed, and the United States deserves for it the imprecations of all who have a sense of justice remaining in them. The probability is that some ignorant scribbler, who had cast his eyes upon the rugged rocks that girdle her seacoast, had represented Lower California as a worthless country, and, that, forgetting justice and good faith, our government left this compromised people to suffer at the hands of their own.”43

Most of the American soldiers and sailors who wrote about their experiences in the Baja California war questioned the reasoning which led to the exclusion of Baja California from the Mexican Cession of 1848.44 The wish to terminate speedily an unpopular war and the poverty of natural resources and rocky terrain of Baja California overwhelmed arguments for the area’s retention. Secretary of State James B. Buchanan decided the issue, on April 15, 1847, when he wrote to United States treaty negotiator Nicholas P. Trist:

“Whilst it is of the greatest importance to the United States to extend their boundaries over Lower California as well as New Mexico and UpperCalifornia, you are not to consider this as a sine qua nonto the exclusion of a treaty. You will, therefore, not break off negotiations if New Mexico and California can alone be acquired.”45

The prosecution and conclusion of the Mexican-American War of 1846 to 1848 illustrate the truism that the nations of the world engage in wars for their own benefit and not for the benefit of people in other countries.

 


NOTES

1. Nathan Covington Brooks, A Complete History of the Mexican War (The Rio Grande Press, Inc., 1965). Justin H. Smith, The War With Mexico, Vols. I and II. (Peter Smith, Gloucester, Mass., 1963).

2. John R. Spears, The History of the Navy, Vol. III (Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1897), pp. 401-409. K. Jack Bauer, Surfboats and Horse Marines (U.S. Naval Institute, Annapolis, Md., 1969).

3. President James K. Polk’s Message on War with Mexico, May 11, 1846, in Documents of American History, 9th edition, Vol. I (Prentice Hall, Inc., 1979), p. 311.

4. House Executive Document 60, Serial 520, 30th Congress, First Session (Washington, D.C., 1848), p. 268.

5. House Executive Document 70, Serial 521, 30th Congress, First Session (Washington, D.C., 1850), p. 48.

6. House Executive Document 17, Serial 573, 31st Congress, First Session (Washington, D.C., 1850), p. 311.

7. Hubert Howe Bancroft, History of the North Mexican States and Texas, Vol. XVI (McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York, 1889), p. 712n.

8. Bauer, p. 209.

9. House Executive Document 17, pp. 310-311.

10. E. Gould Buffum, Six Months in the Gold Mines (Ward Ritchie Press, San Francisco, 1959), pp. 132-133.

11. The ]ournal of Lieutenant Tunis Augustus Macdonough Craven, U.S.N., United States Sloop of War Dale (Ward Ritchie Press, San Francisco, 1973), pp. 65-68 (hereinafter Craven, Journal).

12. Pablo L. Martinez, Historia de Baja California (Mexico, D.F., 1956), p. 374.

13. Doyce B. Nunis, Jr., The Mexican War in Baja California (Dawson’s Book Shop, Los Angeles, 1977), p. 32.

14. “Memorandum of Captain Henry W. Halleck Concerning His Expeditions in Lower California, 1846-1848,” in The Mexican-War in Baja California, edited by Doyce B. Nunis, Jr., pp. 102-103 (hereinafter Halleck, Memorandum).

15. Extracts from the Private Journal-Letters of Captain S. F. Du Pont While in Command of the Cyane During the Mexican War, 1846-1848 (Ferris Brothers, Wilmington, Del., 1885), p. 270 (hereinafter Du Pont, Journal).

16. Proclamation, November 4, 1847, House Executive Document 1, Serial 537 (Washington, D.C., 1848), pp. 1084-1085.

17. House Executive Document 1, pp. 108-111.

18. Halleck, Memorandum, p. 111.

19. Halleck, Memorandum, p. 112.

20. House Executive Document 1, pp. 1112-1115.

21. House Executive Document 1, pp. 1112-1115.

22. House Executive Document 1, pp. 108-111.

23. House Executive Document 1, pp. 108-111.

24. Craven, Journal, p. 80.

25. A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Vol. V (New York, 1897-1911), pp. 2388-2392.

26. Du Pont, journal. pp. 219-220.

27. House Executive Document 1, pp. 1112-1115.

28. Brian F. Smith, “Baja California, Political and Military Ping Pong Ball in the War with Mexico, 1846-1848,” in The Mason Street Papers, Vol. III (San Diego, Calif., 1979), p. 130.

29. House Executive Document 17, p. 515.

30. House Executive Document 1, p. 1146.

31. House Executive Document 17, pp. 518-519.

32. Du Pont, Journal, pp. 363-364.

33. William R. Ryan, Personal Adventures in Upper and Lower California, 1848-1849, Vol. I (William Shoberl Publisher, London, 1850), pp. 138-139.

34. House Executive Document 17, pp. 520-521.

35. House Executive Document 17, pp. 520-521.

36. House Executive Document 17, pp. 520-521.

37. Ryan, pp. 210-211.

38. House Executive Document 1, pp. 1156-1157.

39. House Executive Document 17, pp. 606-612.

40. Burton to Sherman, September 4, 1848, Burton’s Diary and Letterbook, Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, C-B 440.

41. Burton to Sherman, October 11, 1848, Burton’s Diary and Letterbook.

42. Nunis, “Endnotes,” in The Mexican War in Baja California, pp. 148-151.

43. Buffum, p. 144.

44. Buffum, pp. 143-145. Burton, House Executive Document 17, pp. 536-539. Craven, Journal, p. 93, pp. 103-104. Du Pont, Journal, p. 271. Halleck, House Executive Document 17, p. 606-612. Henry Wise, Los Gringos (Baker and Scribner, New York, 1849), pp. 326-327.

45. Diplomatic Correspondence of the United States, Inter-American Affairs, 1831-1860, Vol. VIII (Washington, D.C., 1932-1939), pp. 205-206.