Page:History of the War between the United States and Mexico.djvu/305

Rh placed in charge of Captain McKenzie, 2nd artillery, and Captains Anderson and Taylor, 3rd artillery. Three additional mortars were placed in battery, and the bombardment was kept up without cessation during the day. The flotilla again opened its fire, and Commander Tatnall ventured still nearer to the town and castle; but about nine o'clock all the vessels were recalled by signal, from a position which, as General Scott remarked in his dispatch, had been "too daringly assumed." But the officers and men of the navy were determined to participate in the conflict. At the ear — nest request of Commodore Perry, General Scott assigned a position in the trenches, to be mounted with guns from the squadron, and worked by seamen. A strong battery, number 5, was constructed by the engineers in the rear of a thick mass of Chaparral, and three eight-inch Paixhan guns, and three long thirty-two pounders, were landed, and dragged four miles through the sand by the sailors, assisted by fatigue parties from the brigades of Generals Worth and Pillow. At ten o'clock in the morning of the 24th the pieces were in position; the Chaparral was cut away; and torrents of shot and shell were hurled into the town, tearing and crushing every thing in their range. Within the city the effect of the American fire was terrible and destructive in the extreme. The earth shook at every discharge. Broad sheets of flame appeared to leap forth from the batteries of the assailants. Smoking ruins, crashing roofs and buildings, attested the severity of the bombardment. The firm pavements were thrown up in masses, and deep ridges ploughed in the streets. The iron gratings of the