Page:Young Folks History Of Mexico.pdf/437

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[A. D. 1846.] " believe," says that gifted writer on ancient and modern Mexico, Brantz Mayer, "that our nation and its rulers earnestly desired honorable peace, though they did not shun the alternative of war. It was impossible to permit a conterminous neighbor who owed us large sums of money, and was hostile to the newly-adopted State, to select unopposed her mode and moment of attack. Mexico would neither resign her pretensions upon Texas, negotiate, receive our minister of war, nor remain at peace. She would neither declare war, nor cultivate friendship, and the result was, that when the armies approached each other, but little time was lost in resorting to the cannon and the sword."

In January, 1846, General Zachary Taylor (who became, subsequently. President of the United States) was ordered to move with his men to the mouth of the Rio Grande, where he commenced fortifications opposite the Mexican city of Matamoros.

The first decided act of hostility was a skirmish with rancheros, and on the 24th of April Colonel Thornton, with sixty-three dragoons, fell into an ambuscade and was obliged to surrender, after his little band had lost sixteen killed and wounded. Palo Alto was the point at which the first actual engagement between the rival forces took place, between Point Isabel, General Taylor's base of supplies, and Matamoros. The Mexicans, 6,000 strong, under