Page:History of the War between the United States and Mexico.djvu/533

Rh Marshall left Vera Cruz with over 1,700 men; his command consisting of the 3rd Tennessee, Colonel Cheatham; a battalion of infantry recruits, regulars and volunteers, under Major Morris, of the 4th artillery; and the Georgia cavalry battalion, Lieutenant Colonel Calhoun. Lieutenant Colonel Miles, of the 5th infantry, followed General Marshall on the 2nd of January, 1848, with 1,500 men, and having overtaken the latter at Jalapa, they proceeded together to the city of Mexico. Shortly after the train under Lieutenant Colonel Miles left Vera Cruz, Lieutenant Walker, of the rifle regiment, in command of the rear-guard of thirty men, was attacked by three or four hundred guerilleros, who killed and wounded ten of his men, and captured three hundred pack mules. Neither train was otherwise seriously molested on the march to the capital. The guerilleros had been terribly cut up, and they only appeared in small parties, their principal depredations being committed on the merchant trains.

Upon his arrival at Queretaro, Peña y Peña issued a proclamation urging Congress to hasten the meeting convoked at that place; as there was danger, on the one hand, of losing their nationality, and, on the other, of the increase of the anarchy and confusion prevailing in every quarter of the republic. The country was, indeed, in a most distracted condition. The Puros, or anti-sacerdotal party, in Guadalajara, headed by Gomez Farias, had a violent struggle with their opponents, in which the cathedral was sacked, and a number of persons were killed, among whom was General Ampudia, one of the partisans of Farias. Paredes had an interview With Jarauta at Tulancingo, in October; a