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Chapter 78 Third Time's A Charm
Chapter 78 Third Time's A Charm
"We may have lost to Texas and the Yucatan in the last two wars but history will not repeat itself. For today, Mexico shall stand triumphant!"- Presidente Benito Juarez 1861
"Mark my words, this shall be the last war between us and Mexico."- President Juan Seguin 1861
"The Mexicans, they're different from last time. These aint Santa Anna's boys, they're a different breed altogether."- Major General William B. Travis 1861
For the third time in just twenty-five years where the republics of the Southwest once more engaged in warfare as Mexico once again tried to reassert its original territorial integrity versus the Separatist Republics. In may ways this situation has similarities to the relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom, with all parties involved having another conflict down the line with the Great War. Though unlike the United States with the Oregon War, the Mexican War would not be a mere repetition of the three previous outcomes. When the Republic of the Rio Grande fell, while many Texans and Yucatani were outraged by the atrocities of Satillo and were surprised by the quick speed of the Mexican advance, not to much thought laid upon the capabilities of the Mexicans themselves as the Rio Grande was hardly a nation and the same outcome had happened before in the Border Wars. It was the slight arrogance of the Texan and Yucatani armies that they would have the same outcome as the last two wars with glorious victories against the Mexican army, virtual slaughters due to the might of the invincible Texan and Yucatani soldier. While the Texas-Yucatani alliance would see many victories in the future, they would not have an easy time like with Santa Anna. For Mexico was united in no way like ever before in its history, with its military being drilled to perfection for the outcome of the glorious reconquest. Texas and the Yucatan would learn of this soon enough, the real question was whether they would adapt and overcome their new powerful foe.
Rio Grande: After the conquest of Satillo, both Austin and Merida had been hopeful that the Rio Grande would provide Mexico with the same numerous troubles that had led to the instability and eventual downfall of the Republic. Mainly in that the people would be resistant to Mexico and would cause an endless insurgency due to the lawless nature of the Rio Grande. To their great shock (though unexpected in hindsight) none of this happened as a supermajority of the Rio Grande population turned out to be Mexican patriots. The Rio Grande citizens had been tired of the endless regime changes and constant instability and warfare thanks to the filibusters. Juarez was seen as salvation to many of the Rio Grande peoples as he could finally bring back order to the lands. With the high amount of support the Mexican army was able to establish a military occupation with little issues besides a few isolated incidents from rebellious citizens. Mexican soldiers were able to walk around the streets of various Rio Grande towns and were constantly cheered and showered with gifts and jubilation by the townspeople. With no effort necessary to prevent the rise of a rebellious population, the Mexican Army spent most of its resources preparing for the eventual invasion of Texas or a possible counterattack by the Texans.
Rio Grande River: While both Texas and Mexico hated each other with a passion similar to the French and the British, it would take many months until each side fired a single shot. The main reason for this is due to the vastness of both countries and the immense logistics required to invade either side. Texas stretched near 1700 miles from the Sabine to the Pacific Ocean while Mexico had a near 2,000 mile border with both Texas and the Rio Grande. While the Rio Grande occupation was immensely successful, Mexico now had to take the time to prepare its troops to cross into Texas by preparing the long supply lines and dividing the men according to groups that would take key points of interest. What made the situation even worse for Mexico was the fact that Texas' southern border was a near hellish landscape as it was mostly nothing but scorching deserts, steep mountains, and the deep and dangerous waters of the Rio Grande. There were few if any passable routes to Texas and the border towns that did exist were heavily guarded. Meanwhile for Texas it had the rough task of trying to organize an army of volunteers across its large land as Texas had many natural barriers internally and the populations were rather sparse and dispersed with the exceptions of some cities in both California and Texas. The only Commonwealth who had even a remotely quick time raising arms was California due to the large population shift on the coast and greater connection compared to Texas, Deseret, or Arizona. Some small skirmishes did take place across the borders with the first meetings of the Republican Guard and Texas Rangers, both forces being evenly matched and often fighting to draws. While there were at the same time occasional fights with the Apache. From June 1861 to December 1861, this phase of the war has often been called by historians as the "Phony War", due to the continued state of war existing but with little action except for Baja California. However for both sides it was time well spent as Juarez prepared his divisions for the defense of the Rio Grande with multiple forts erected in the various towns while planning for an exact intrusion into Texas. Meanwhile President Juarez was able to fully mobilize the 10,000 men of the Texan Army along with the 6,000 French troops and 5,000 Texas Rangers. In addition there was a grand total of over 100,000 men who volunteered for the army. Just like the previous wars, the Texas Army was a rather diverse force with Chinese, Irish, and Slavs now noticeable among the ranks of the enlisted. With all final preparations being done the time had come with Generals Travis and Zaragoza implementing their respective strikes against the enemy. Both sides would see an equal amount of success and failure in what would become known as the Christmas Invasions.
Texan volunteers undergoing training for the eventual invasion of Mexico
Baja California: Since its annexation by the Republic of Texas, the peninsula of Baja California had been a rather sleep and backward part of the nation. The main reason for this is that Baja California was a rather dry and mountainous region with little room for agriculture, most members of the population being fishermen or small sustenance farmers. In the California Gold Rush there had been a small spike in numbers with many looking for gold and hoping it would be plentiful like up north. However with the exception of the city of Tijuana there was little investment or development in the region. According to the 1860 Texas Census, Baja California only held 53,409 people, compared to greater California which held 27 times the greater population. Due to its unimportance and relatively little contact with the nearby state of Sonora, it was thought by many Californians that Baja California would be left out of the war, they were wrong. As evidenced by the later ludicrous invasion of Arizona, Mexico's actions during the war were focused on getting ALL land reunited with the mother country. This included many swaths of land that held little strategic value such as Baja California. As such instead of naturally waiting to cross into California proper, Colonel Domingo Valentin led an amphibious invasion of Baja California to strike Texas at its southern panhandle. Waiting until Sonora would be cleared of any threats from Chihuahua and Durango, Valentin and his men led an invasion on October 11th to catch Texas by suprise when the main invasion commenced. The assault consisted of 4,000 men who were mostly volunteers from Sonora. The main reason that the invasion even remotely succeeded in the first place was because most ships of the Texas Pacific squadron were focused on the central states and did not expect such a large force to cross the Gulf of California. A major strategic blunder on the part of the Texas Navy. The men marched several miles from the southern tip of the coast where they landed in order to "liberate" their brethren. To the shock of the Mexican troops who would later find this out in other areas of Texas, the largely homogeneous population of Tejanos that were conquered while not providing resistance, did not rise up in support of Mexico either. The local Tejanos of Baja California were a rather docile people and had favorable treatment from Monterrey in the past 25 years with the area being left with a high amount of decentralization and autonomy. The main battle that took place on the Peninsula campaign was the Battle of Fort Alacorn where the 4,000 Mexican force surrounded the small fort which was situated in the direct center of the peninsula. The fort which was usually staffed by near 700 men had been drained due to the war and only had 164 on hand with an extra 62 men on hand who were Texas Rangers. On November 5th the battle took place as the Mexican regiment was met by an intense cavalry charge of 53 Texans and a brief shootout ensued with the Texans harassing Mexican lines. While the Mexicans had driven off the Texan group, they had taken a decent amount of casualties with 25 men killed and 18 wounded while the Texans had suffered 7 killed and 6 wounded who were captured. When the Mexican forces reached the fort they sent our three volleys from the accompanying 25 pieces of artillery before they sent out an envoy offering surrender. The Texan garrison having realized that they were surrounded immensely and had no hope in hell to defend the fort like the Alamo, surrendered with Major Victor Torres surrendering the 147 men remaining in the fort, six having died in the bombardment. What Colonel Valentin did not realize however when he captured the fort was that the earlier charge by the Texans was a distraction to provide an escape for the 62 Texas Rangers who under the command of Captain Esteban Hidalgo escaped north at a fast pace to warn California of the invasion and ask Monterrey for reinforcements, leading to the Battles of Tijuana and San Diego.
View attachment 317239
Mexican assault of Fort Alacorn
Yucatan: The beginning of the Mexican War would've been the perfect time for Yucatan President Manuel Peraza to strike as it would've ensured a quick and straight thrust into Southern Mexico with the potential to take Mexico City. While there were the various state militias along with brigades of the Mexican army in the way, most Mexican resources and manpower at the time was concentrated near the Rio Grande and Texas. While this was the plan for President Peraza at first, other factors postponed this. When word reached back of the Mexican victories in the Rio Grande and how swift it was, thousands of Creoles in the districts of Chiapas and Tobasco rose up in rebellion for unification with Mexico. These Mexican patriots were members of the Republic who still resented their conquest by the Yucatan in the Revolution and were appalled by their coexistence with the Mayans who they viewed as inferior to them. In the Border Wars there had not been much commotion as the invaders that time were rogue governors from states that were rivals with Tobasco and Chiapas during their time in Mexico. Here the hope of reunification was large thanks to Juarez's firm leadership. At the same time some Central American nationalists had risen up in the former Central American Republics in hopes of reviving their old nation. With the unexpected rise in rebel activity the Yucatan Army was forced to put resources on keeping control within their borders. However unlike the Rio Grande, Yucatan was still largely united as the rebels were a small minority compared to the greater population of patriots. The Mayan people who did not want to go back to being second-class citizens of Mexico were largely in support of Merida. Even among the creoles in rebel areas there was a significant majority in favor of Merida as the young generation had grown up under the stable rule of Barbachano and his successors while there were little social or economic conditions to rile up a large number of adults to the support of Mexico. The case was especially true in Central America as there was little large remembrance or love for the old USCA, in fact many of the rebellions in Central America were put down by the local population before the people arrived. Within weeks all dissent in Central America ceased and most organized resistance in Chiapas and Tobasco had been run down. Yet during all this time the Mexican forces did not sit idly by and were preparing for attack. On September 4th the Southern Mexican Army under the command of General Carlos Fierro made their way across the border. This army was made up of 20,000 regulars along with 30,000 volunteers, both sides being split in half with 25,000 into the states of Chiapas and Tobasco. The invaders itching to teach the traitorous Creoles and upstart Mayans a lesson they wouldn't forget.
Navy: Unlike the land warfare where both sides where more or less evenly matched, the naval warfare of the Mexican War was entire one sided with Texas and to a lesser extant the Yucatan having naval superiority throughout the entire conflict. While Juarez had spent a large amount of time and money reforming the army, very little attention if any was given to Mexico's nonexistent Navy. The main reason for this was Juarez, and much of the Mexican generals belief, that the Mexican War would be one fought entirely on land due to all three republic's connection to Mexico with the borders and no overseas territories from which to conquer. While it is true that naval superiority would've helped Mexico even the fight with Texas and the Yucatan both in the pacific and the Gulf of Mexico, it just simply wasn't a priority in the mind of Juarez. Even if the President did want a Navy anyways it would've been near impossible due to the large amount of budget and foreign loans already used on the Army and most Mexican naval officers either having been dead, retired, or defected to Texas and the Yucatan. Due to this only a few patrol boats were built by the Mexican Navy, mainly just so that Mexico could protect its mercantile fleet in peace time. This allowed both Texas and the Yucatan to blockade Mexico at the start of the war with Rear Admiral Edwin Moore and Commodore Phillipe Rodriguez reprising their earlier roles in the Filibuster war with a blockade of the Gulf and Pacific respectively. This time they were joined by the 15 ship Yucatan fleet commanded by Commodore Armando Gutierrez, Yucatan placing 10 ships in the Gulf and 5 in the pacific. Of the entire Mexican War there is little action of note as it was mainly both Texas and the Yucatan preventing Mexican trade ships and fishing boats from entering into ocean and occasionally providing support for operations near ports and coastal towns in Mexico. At the start of the war both Texas and Yucatan fleets set out to the coast of Mexico and began a campaign of bombardment against various ports to ruin the Mexican economy by preventing any aid from going out or within Mexico. The most successful was the bombardment against the city of Veracruz on August 14th with over half the port being destroyed by four Texan frigates. Whatever ships Mexico did have were either sunk in port or in open ocean. What little Mexican trade going in and out were either due to the trade of strong powers like Great Britain or Mexican blockade runners in a similar fashion to the Confederacy. However Mexico only had a slight amount of success on the Pacific. What is noticeable about the Mexican War however is that it was the first conflict in which both Texas and Yucatan used completely steam ships. Meanwhile the Texan Navy would be observing the Union blockade with close oversight in order to better learn for the fight against Mexico and for future warfare.
View attachment 317238
A convoy of Mexican blockade runners in the Pacific
"We may have lost to Texas and the Yucatan in the last two wars but history will not repeat itself. For today, Mexico shall stand triumphant!"- Presidente Benito Juarez 1861
"Mark my words, this shall be the last war between us and Mexico."- President Juan Seguin 1861
"The Mexicans, they're different from last time. These aint Santa Anna's boys, they're a different breed altogether."- Major General William B. Travis 1861
For the third time in just twenty-five years where the republics of the Southwest once more engaged in warfare as Mexico once again tried to reassert its original territorial integrity versus the Separatist Republics. In may ways this situation has similarities to the relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom, with all parties involved having another conflict down the line with the Great War. Though unlike the United States with the Oregon War, the Mexican War would not be a mere repetition of the three previous outcomes. When the Republic of the Rio Grande fell, while many Texans and Yucatani were outraged by the atrocities of Satillo and were surprised by the quick speed of the Mexican advance, not to much thought laid upon the capabilities of the Mexicans themselves as the Rio Grande was hardly a nation and the same outcome had happened before in the Border Wars. It was the slight arrogance of the Texan and Yucatani armies that they would have the same outcome as the last two wars with glorious victories against the Mexican army, virtual slaughters due to the might of the invincible Texan and Yucatani soldier. While the Texas-Yucatani alliance would see many victories in the future, they would not have an easy time like with Santa Anna. For Mexico was united in no way like ever before in its history, with its military being drilled to perfection for the outcome of the glorious reconquest. Texas and the Yucatan would learn of this soon enough, the real question was whether they would adapt and overcome their new powerful foe.
Rio Grande: After the conquest of Satillo, both Austin and Merida had been hopeful that the Rio Grande would provide Mexico with the same numerous troubles that had led to the instability and eventual downfall of the Republic. Mainly in that the people would be resistant to Mexico and would cause an endless insurgency due to the lawless nature of the Rio Grande. To their great shock (though unexpected in hindsight) none of this happened as a supermajority of the Rio Grande population turned out to be Mexican patriots. The Rio Grande citizens had been tired of the endless regime changes and constant instability and warfare thanks to the filibusters. Juarez was seen as salvation to many of the Rio Grande peoples as he could finally bring back order to the lands. With the high amount of support the Mexican army was able to establish a military occupation with little issues besides a few isolated incidents from rebellious citizens. Mexican soldiers were able to walk around the streets of various Rio Grande towns and were constantly cheered and showered with gifts and jubilation by the townspeople. With no effort necessary to prevent the rise of a rebellious population, the Mexican Army spent most of its resources preparing for the eventual invasion of Texas or a possible counterattack by the Texans.
Rio Grande River: While both Texas and Mexico hated each other with a passion similar to the French and the British, it would take many months until each side fired a single shot. The main reason for this is due to the vastness of both countries and the immense logistics required to invade either side. Texas stretched near 1700 miles from the Sabine to the Pacific Ocean while Mexico had a near 2,000 mile border with both Texas and the Rio Grande. While the Rio Grande occupation was immensely successful, Mexico now had to take the time to prepare its troops to cross into Texas by preparing the long supply lines and dividing the men according to groups that would take key points of interest. What made the situation even worse for Mexico was the fact that Texas' southern border was a near hellish landscape as it was mostly nothing but scorching deserts, steep mountains, and the deep and dangerous waters of the Rio Grande. There were few if any passable routes to Texas and the border towns that did exist were heavily guarded. Meanwhile for Texas it had the rough task of trying to organize an army of volunteers across its large land as Texas had many natural barriers internally and the populations were rather sparse and dispersed with the exceptions of some cities in both California and Texas. The only Commonwealth who had even a remotely quick time raising arms was California due to the large population shift on the coast and greater connection compared to Texas, Deseret, or Arizona. Some small skirmishes did take place across the borders with the first meetings of the Republican Guard and Texas Rangers, both forces being evenly matched and often fighting to draws. While there were at the same time occasional fights with the Apache. From June 1861 to December 1861, this phase of the war has often been called by historians as the "Phony War", due to the continued state of war existing but with little action except for Baja California. However for both sides it was time well spent as Juarez prepared his divisions for the defense of the Rio Grande with multiple forts erected in the various towns while planning for an exact intrusion into Texas. Meanwhile President Juarez was able to fully mobilize the 10,000 men of the Texan Army along with the 6,000 French troops and 5,000 Texas Rangers. In addition there was a grand total of over 100,000 men who volunteered for the army. Just like the previous wars, the Texas Army was a rather diverse force with Chinese, Irish, and Slavs now noticeable among the ranks of the enlisted. With all final preparations being done the time had come with Generals Travis and Zaragoza implementing their respective strikes against the enemy. Both sides would see an equal amount of success and failure in what would become known as the Christmas Invasions.
Texan volunteers undergoing training for the eventual invasion of Mexico
Baja California: Since its annexation by the Republic of Texas, the peninsula of Baja California had been a rather sleep and backward part of the nation. The main reason for this is that Baja California was a rather dry and mountainous region with little room for agriculture, most members of the population being fishermen or small sustenance farmers. In the California Gold Rush there had been a small spike in numbers with many looking for gold and hoping it would be plentiful like up north. However with the exception of the city of Tijuana there was little investment or development in the region. According to the 1860 Texas Census, Baja California only held 53,409 people, compared to greater California which held 27 times the greater population. Due to its unimportance and relatively little contact with the nearby state of Sonora, it was thought by many Californians that Baja California would be left out of the war, they were wrong. As evidenced by the later ludicrous invasion of Arizona, Mexico's actions during the war were focused on getting ALL land reunited with the mother country. This included many swaths of land that held little strategic value such as Baja California. As such instead of naturally waiting to cross into California proper, Colonel Domingo Valentin led an amphibious invasion of Baja California to strike Texas at its southern panhandle. Waiting until Sonora would be cleared of any threats from Chihuahua and Durango, Valentin and his men led an invasion on October 11th to catch Texas by suprise when the main invasion commenced. The assault consisted of 4,000 men who were mostly volunteers from Sonora. The main reason that the invasion even remotely succeeded in the first place was because most ships of the Texas Pacific squadron were focused on the central states and did not expect such a large force to cross the Gulf of California. A major strategic blunder on the part of the Texas Navy. The men marched several miles from the southern tip of the coast where they landed in order to "liberate" their brethren. To the shock of the Mexican troops who would later find this out in other areas of Texas, the largely homogeneous population of Tejanos that were conquered while not providing resistance, did not rise up in support of Mexico either. The local Tejanos of Baja California were a rather docile people and had favorable treatment from Monterrey in the past 25 years with the area being left with a high amount of decentralization and autonomy. The main battle that took place on the Peninsula campaign was the Battle of Fort Alacorn where the 4,000 Mexican force surrounded the small fort which was situated in the direct center of the peninsula. The fort which was usually staffed by near 700 men had been drained due to the war and only had 164 on hand with an extra 62 men on hand who were Texas Rangers. On November 5th the battle took place as the Mexican regiment was met by an intense cavalry charge of 53 Texans and a brief shootout ensued with the Texans harassing Mexican lines. While the Mexicans had driven off the Texan group, they had taken a decent amount of casualties with 25 men killed and 18 wounded while the Texans had suffered 7 killed and 6 wounded who were captured. When the Mexican forces reached the fort they sent our three volleys from the accompanying 25 pieces of artillery before they sent out an envoy offering surrender. The Texan garrison having realized that they were surrounded immensely and had no hope in hell to defend the fort like the Alamo, surrendered with Major Victor Torres surrendering the 147 men remaining in the fort, six having died in the bombardment. What Colonel Valentin did not realize however when he captured the fort was that the earlier charge by the Texans was a distraction to provide an escape for the 62 Texas Rangers who under the command of Captain Esteban Hidalgo escaped north at a fast pace to warn California of the invasion and ask Monterrey for reinforcements, leading to the Battles of Tijuana and San Diego.
View attachment 317239
Mexican assault of Fort Alacorn
Yucatan: The beginning of the Mexican War would've been the perfect time for Yucatan President Manuel Peraza to strike as it would've ensured a quick and straight thrust into Southern Mexico with the potential to take Mexico City. While there were the various state militias along with brigades of the Mexican army in the way, most Mexican resources and manpower at the time was concentrated near the Rio Grande and Texas. While this was the plan for President Peraza at first, other factors postponed this. When word reached back of the Mexican victories in the Rio Grande and how swift it was, thousands of Creoles in the districts of Chiapas and Tobasco rose up in rebellion for unification with Mexico. These Mexican patriots were members of the Republic who still resented their conquest by the Yucatan in the Revolution and were appalled by their coexistence with the Mayans who they viewed as inferior to them. In the Border Wars there had not been much commotion as the invaders that time were rogue governors from states that were rivals with Tobasco and Chiapas during their time in Mexico. Here the hope of reunification was large thanks to Juarez's firm leadership. At the same time some Central American nationalists had risen up in the former Central American Republics in hopes of reviving their old nation. With the unexpected rise in rebel activity the Yucatan Army was forced to put resources on keeping control within their borders. However unlike the Rio Grande, Yucatan was still largely united as the rebels were a small minority compared to the greater population of patriots. The Mayan people who did not want to go back to being second-class citizens of Mexico were largely in support of Merida. Even among the creoles in rebel areas there was a significant majority in favor of Merida as the young generation had grown up under the stable rule of Barbachano and his successors while there were little social or economic conditions to rile up a large number of adults to the support of Mexico. The case was especially true in Central America as there was little large remembrance or love for the old USCA, in fact many of the rebellions in Central America were put down by the local population before the people arrived. Within weeks all dissent in Central America ceased and most organized resistance in Chiapas and Tobasco had been run down. Yet during all this time the Mexican forces did not sit idly by and were preparing for attack. On September 4th the Southern Mexican Army under the command of General Carlos Fierro made their way across the border. This army was made up of 20,000 regulars along with 30,000 volunteers, both sides being split in half with 25,000 into the states of Chiapas and Tobasco. The invaders itching to teach the traitorous Creoles and upstart Mayans a lesson they wouldn't forget.
Navy: Unlike the land warfare where both sides where more or less evenly matched, the naval warfare of the Mexican War was entire one sided with Texas and to a lesser extant the Yucatan having naval superiority throughout the entire conflict. While Juarez had spent a large amount of time and money reforming the army, very little attention if any was given to Mexico's nonexistent Navy. The main reason for this was Juarez, and much of the Mexican generals belief, that the Mexican War would be one fought entirely on land due to all three republic's connection to Mexico with the borders and no overseas territories from which to conquer. While it is true that naval superiority would've helped Mexico even the fight with Texas and the Yucatan both in the pacific and the Gulf of Mexico, it just simply wasn't a priority in the mind of Juarez. Even if the President did want a Navy anyways it would've been near impossible due to the large amount of budget and foreign loans already used on the Army and most Mexican naval officers either having been dead, retired, or defected to Texas and the Yucatan. Due to this only a few patrol boats were built by the Mexican Navy, mainly just so that Mexico could protect its mercantile fleet in peace time. This allowed both Texas and the Yucatan to blockade Mexico at the start of the war with Rear Admiral Edwin Moore and Commodore Phillipe Rodriguez reprising their earlier roles in the Filibuster war with a blockade of the Gulf and Pacific respectively. This time they were joined by the 15 ship Yucatan fleet commanded by Commodore Armando Gutierrez, Yucatan placing 10 ships in the Gulf and 5 in the pacific. Of the entire Mexican War there is little action of note as it was mainly both Texas and the Yucatan preventing Mexican trade ships and fishing boats from entering into ocean and occasionally providing support for operations near ports and coastal towns in Mexico. At the start of the war both Texas and Yucatan fleets set out to the coast of Mexico and began a campaign of bombardment against various ports to ruin the Mexican economy by preventing any aid from going out or within Mexico. The most successful was the bombardment against the city of Veracruz on August 14th with over half the port being destroyed by four Texan frigates. Whatever ships Mexico did have were either sunk in port or in open ocean. What little Mexican trade going in and out were either due to the trade of strong powers like Great Britain or Mexican blockade runners in a similar fashion to the Confederacy. However Mexico only had a slight amount of success on the Pacific. What is noticeable about the Mexican War however is that it was the first conflict in which both Texas and Yucatan used completely steam ships. Meanwhile the Texan Navy would be observing the Union blockade with close oversight in order to better learn for the fight against Mexico and for future warfare.
View attachment 317238
A convoy of Mexican blockade runners in the Pacific
- Kaiser Chris
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