Tag: Mexican American war

When is a Rebel Not a Traitor?

When is a Rebel Not a Traitor?

In 1846, early in the Mexican American War, General Stephen Watts Kearny led his Army of the West from Missouri to Santa Fe. He received no resistance in New Mexico and raised the American flag over the Santa Fe plaza in mid-August. By early November, he had moved on to assist in the subjugation of California, leaving troops behind to hold New Mexico. Local leaders laid plans to kick out the remaining troops, but the plot was discovered in mid-December and the most of them were apprehended.

One of the men jailed was Manuel Antonio Chaves, who seems to have been the only one who went to court for his activities. Maybe his was the first and last case at this time because his American lawyer, Captain William Z. Angney, got him off.

Manuel Antonio Chaves, courtesy of Gill Chaves, 2019

Angney’s arguments were powerful. Chaves had been charged with treason against the United States. Angney argued that, since the war was still in progress, New Mexico was technically still part of the country of Mexico, and therefore Chaves was not an American citizen. You can’t try someone for treason against a country they don’t belong to. In fact, it was not treason, but patriotism, that motivated his actions.

Chaves was acquitted and released. His experience with Angney and in the courtroom seems to have permanently changed his view of Americans. Six months earlier, he’d argued fiercely that New Mexico ought to fight the invaders. The month after his release, he was fighting alongside the Americans to suppress the New Mexican revolt that broke out in Taos. He went on to serve in the Civil War on the side of the Union, rising to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and playing a key role in the pivotal battle of Glorieta Pass. All because his perceived enemy (Captain Angney) defended Chaves’s right to rebel.

Sources: Mark L. Gardner and Marc Simmons, eds., The Mexican War Correspondence of Richard Smith Elliott; Rubén Sálaz Márquez, New Mexico, A Brief Multi-History; Marc Simmons, The Little Lion of the Southwest, a life of Manuel Antonio Chaves; Ralph Emerson Twitchell, The History of the Military Occupation of the Territory of New Mexico.

© Loretta Miles Tollefson, 2025

Mormon Battalion Reaches Las Vegas

In early October 1846, the 500-member Mormon Battalion of Volunteers of the U.S. Army of the West marched through Las Vegas, New Mexico. They were on their way to California from Council Bluffs, Iowa, where they’d volunteered to fight in the Mexican-American conflict.

Their service had two conditions. First, each man would receive his $42 uniform allowance in advance but would wear his civilian clothing on the march. This enabled the men to donate most of their clothing money to the Church to buy wagons, animals, and other necessities for the coming move to what is now Utah. Second, the Battalion members would serve twelve months and no longer.

These men hadn’t volunteered because they supported the war against Mexico. Their leaders had asked them to join up. The Latter Day Saints needed Federal government agreement to cross what was rapidly becoming U.S. Territory and settle around the Great Salt Lake.

The LDS leadership also hoped that the Volunteers, the only single-religion battalion in U.S. military history, would help change public perception of the Church and its members by demonstrating their loyalty to the United States.

The Mormon Battalion was divided into two groups which traveled several days apart, but they were all in Santa Fe by mid-October 1846, where they met their new Captain, Philip St. George Cooke.

Oct 3 post illustration.Cooke

They were now about 45 percent through their 2,000 mile trek. Mountain man Jean Baptiste Charbonneau, the child born to Sacagawea during the 1805 Lewis and Clark Expedition, would guide them the rest of the way. Charbonneau, Cooke, and the men of the Mormon Battalion would create Cooke’s Wagon Road, a route used after American annexation to transport goods and people to California.

They arrived in California in January 1847, shortly after Mexican capitulation to John Fremont, and therefore didn’t see battle. But they completed other useful tasks and fulfilled their full twelve month contract. After their service expired, some of the Battalion members stayed in California. A few of them were working at Sutter’s Mill when gold was discovered there on January 24, 1848.

As a result, not only did the Church receive much of the $30,000 the volunteers had earned during their military service, it also received $17,000 in contributions from the first fruits of what would become the 1849 California Gold Rush. Those funds were instrumental in getting the LDS congregation through the winter, providing the means for their epic journey to the Great Salt Lake area, and helping to establish them there.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormon_Battalion Accessed 9/4/19; Paul J. Horgan, Great River, the Rio Grande in North American History, Connecticut: Wesleyan UP, 1984;  John W. Kirshon, Ed., Chronicle of America, Mt. Kisko: Chronicle Press, circa 1989; Benjamin M. Read, Illustrated History Of New Mexico, Santa Fe, 1912;  Ralph E. Twitchell The Leading Facts of New Mexican History, Vol. 2, Cedar Rapids: Torch Press;  www.mormonbattalion.com Accessed 9/4/19.