Events transpire rapidly when a country is in a state of revolution.
Early in March of '46 the little party of explorers received the "first
hostile message" from General Castro--the _Commandant_ General of
California--which, though really a declaration of war, upon a party sent
out by the United States Government on a purely scientific expedition,
had been received and acted upon by Fremont with moderation, and actual
war had not been declared until July, when Sonoma was taken, and the
flag of Independence hoisted on the fourth of that month, and Fremont
elected Governor of California.
While hearing indefinitely of these events, Commodore Sloat, who, with
the vessels belonging to his command, was lying at Monterey, had hoisted
the flag of the United States over that city, anticipating any command
to do so on the part of his government, and anticipating also the
action of the commander of the British ship of war, sent for a similar
purpose, which arrived at Monterey on the 19th of July, under the
command of Sir George Seymour; one of whose officers, in a book
published by him after his return to England, describes the entrance of
Fremont and his party into Monterey as follows:
"During our stay in Monterey," says Mr. Walpole, "Captain Fremont and
his party arrived. They naturally excited curiosity. Here were true
trappers, the class that produced the heroes of Fennimore Cooper's best
works. These men had passed years in the wilds, living upon their own
resources; they were a curious set. A vast cloud of dust appeared first,
and thence in long file emerged this wildest wild party. Fremont rode
ahead, a spare, active-looking man, with such an eye! He was dressed in
a blouse and leggings, and wore a felt hat. After him came five Delaware
Indians, who were his body-guard, and have been with him through all his
wanderings; they had charge of two baggage horses. The rest, many of
them blacker than the Indians, rode two and two, the rifle held by one
hand across the pommel of the saddle. Thirty-nine of them are his
regular men, the rest are loafers picked up lately; his original men
are principally backwoodsmen, from the State of Tennessee and the banks
of the upper waters of the Missouri. He has one or two with him who
enjoy a high reputation in the prairies. Kit Carson is as well known
there as 'the Duke' is in Europe. The dress of these men was principally
a long loose coat of deer skin, tied with thongs in front; trowsers of
the same, of their own manufacture, which, when wet through, they take
off, scrape well inside with a knife, and put on as soon as dry; the
saddles were of various fashions, though these and a large drove of
horses, and a brass field-gun, were things they had picked up about
California. They are allowed no liquor, tea and sugar only; this, no
doubt, has much to do with their good conduct; and the discipline, too,
is very strict. They were marched up to an open space on the hills near
the town, under some large fires, and there took up their quarters, in
messes of six or seven, in the open air. The Indians lay beside their
leader. One man, a doctor, six feet six high, was an odd-looking fellow.
May I never come under his hands!"
Commodore Stockton had arrived the same day with Fremont and Carson and
their command, and under him Fremont had been appointed General in
Chief of the California forces, with Carson for his first Lieutenant;
Stockton assuming the civil office of Governor of the country. This had
been deemed a measure of necessity, from the fact that the California
Mexicans had not yet learned, from the Mexican authorities, the actual
declaration of war between the United States and Mexico; and therefore
looked upon the operations of the Americans as the acts of adventurers
for their own aggrandizement; and yet, with all the intensity of feeling
such ideas aroused, Fremont and Carson had won their admiration and
their hearts, by the rapidity of their movements, their sudden and
effective blows, and the effort by dispatch to avoid all cruelty and
bloodshed as far as possible.
In this way had San Diego, San Pedro, Los Angelos, Santa Barbara, and
the whole country, as the Mexican authorities declared, come into the
possession of Commodore Stockton and General Fremont, as a conquered
territory, taken in behalf of the United States; and the whole work been
completed in about sixty days from the time the first blow was struck;
and when all was accomplished, and the conquest complete, Carson started
upon his errand to communicate the intelligence to the general
government at Washington; with the knowledge that all the leading
citizens of California, native as well as the American settlers, were
friendly to Fremont, and on his account to Commodore Stockton.
During the three months of Carson's absence, events had transpired that
made it necessary to do this work over again, resulting in a measure
from the indiscretions of American officers, which induced insurrection
on the part of the Mexicans. The arrival of General Kearney with United
States troops still further excited them, and produced results which
were everything but pleasant to Fremont and Commodore Stockton, the
details of which we forbear to give, simply saying that Carson's regard
for Fremont showed itself by his return to his service, and doing all
that he could to forward his interests, and in his often attending him
in his excursions. Fremont's command was an independent battalion; and
concerning the last and final contest, General Kearney thus wrote to the
War Department:
"This morning, Lieutenant-Colonel Fremont, of the regiment of mounted
riflemen, reached here with four hundred volunteers from the Sacramento;
the enemy capitulated with him yesterday, near San Fernando, agreeing
to lay down their arms; and we have now the prospect of having peace and
quietness in this country, which I hope may not be interrupted again."
It was during Carson's absence, en route for Washington, that Fremont
accomplished the most extraordinary feat of physical energy and
endurance ever recorded. We find it in the "National Intelligencer," of
November 22, 1847, and quote it entire, as illustrating not only the
physical powers of human endurance produced by practice and culture, but
the wonderful sagacity and enduring qualities of the California horses:
"THE EXTRAORDINARY RIDE OF LIEUT. COL. FREMONT, HIS FRIEND DON
JESUS PICO, AND HIS SERVANT, JACOB DODSON, FROM LOS ANGELOS TO
MONTEREY AND BACK IN MARCH, 1847.
"This extraordinary ride of 800 miles in eight days, including all
stoppages and near two days' detention--a whole day and a night at
Monterey, and nearly two half days at San Luis Obispo--having been
brought into evidence before the Army Court Martial now in session in
this city, and great desire being expressed by some friends to know how
the ride was made, I herewith send you the particulars, that you may
publish them, if you please, in the National Intelligencer, as an
incident connected with the times and affairs under review in the trial,
of which you give so full a report. The circumstances were first got
from Jacob, afterwards revised by Col. Fremont, and I drew them up from
his statement.
"The publication will show, besides the horsemanship of the riders, the
power of the California horse, especially as one of the horses was
subjected, in the course of the ride, to an extraordinary trial, in
order to exhibit the capacity of his race. Of course this statement will
make no allusion to the objects of the journey, but be confined strictly
to its performance.
"It was at daybreak on the morning of the 22d of March, that the party
set out from La Ciudad de los Angelos (the city of the Angels) in the
southern part of Upper California, to proceed, in the shortest time, to
Monterey on the Pacific coast, distant full four hundred miles. The way
is over a mountainous country, much of it uninhabited, with no other
road than a trace, and many defiles to pass, particularly the maritime
defile of _el Rincon_ or Punto Gordo, fifteen miles in extent, made by
the jutting of a precipitous mountain into the sea, and which can only
be passed when the tide is out and the sea calm, and then in many places
through the waves. The towns of Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo, and
occasional ranches, are the principal inhabited places on the route.
Each of the party had three horses, nine in all, to take their turns
under the saddle. The six loose horses ran ahead, without bridle or
halter, and required some attention to keep to the track. When wanted
for a change, say at the distance of twenty miles, they were caught by
the _lasso_, thrown either by Don Jesus or the servant Jacob, who,
though born in Washington, in his long expeditions with Col. Fremont,
had become as expert as a Mexican with the lasso, as sure as the
mountaineer with the rifle, equal to either on horse or foot, and always
a lad of courage and fidelity.
"None of the horses were shod, that being a practice unknown to the
Californians. The most usual gait was a sweeping gallop. The first day
they ran one hundred and twenty-five miles, passing the San Fernando
mountain, the defile of the Rincon, several other mountains, and slept
at the hospitable ranche of Don Thomas Robberis, beyond the town of
Santa Barbara. The only fatigue complained of in this day's ride, was
in Jacob's right arm, made tired by throwing the lasso, and using it as
a whip to keep the loose horses to the track.
"The next day they made another one hundred and twenty-five miles,
passing the formidable mountain of Santa Barbara, and counting upon it
the skeletons of some fifty horses, part of near double that number
which perished in the crossing of that terrible mountain by the
California battalion, on Christmas day, 1846, amidst a raging tempest,
and a deluge of rain and cold more killing than that of the Sierra
Nevada--the day of severest suffering, say Fremont and his men, that
they have ever passed. At sunset, the party stopped to sup with the
friendly Capt. Dana, and at nine at night San Luis Obispo was reached,
the home of Don Jesus, and where an affecting reception awaited
Lieutenant-Colonel Fremont, in consequence of an incident which occurred
there that history will one day record; and he was detained till 10
o'clock in the morning receiving the visits of the inhabitants, (mothers
and children included,) taking a breakfast of honor, and waiting for a
relief of fresh horses to be brought in from the surrounding country.
Here the nine horses from Los Angelos were left, and eight others taken
in their place, and a Spanish boy added to the party to assist in
managing the loose horses.
"Proceeding at the usual gait till eight at night, and having made some
seventy miles, Don Jesus, who had spent the night before with his family
and friends, and probably with but little sleep, became fatigued, and
proposed a halt for a few hours. It was in the valley of the Salinas
(salt river called _Buenaventura_ in the old maps,) and the haunt of
marauding Indians. For safety during their repose, the party turned off
the trace, issued through a _cañon_ into a thick wood, and laid down,
the horses being put to grass at a short distance, with the Spanish boy
in the saddle to watch. Sleep, when commenced, was too sweet to be
easily given up, and it was half way between midnight and day, when the
sleepers were aroused by an _estampedo_ among the horses, and the calls
of the boy. The cause of the alarm was soon found, not Indians, but
white bears--this valley being their great resort, and the place where
Col. Fremont and thirty-five of his men encountered some hundred of them
the summer before, killing thirty upon the ground.
"The character of these bears is well known, and the bravest hunters do
not like to meet them without the advantage of numbers. On discovering
the enemy, Col. Fremont felt for his pistols, but Don Jesus desired him
to lie still, saying that 'people could scare bears;' and immediately
hallooed at them in Spanish, and they went off. Sleep went off also; and
the recovery of the horses frightened by the bears, building a rousing
fire, making a breakfast from the hospitable supplies of San Luis
Obispo, occupied the party till daybreak, when the journey was resumed.
Eighty miles, and the afternoon brought the party to Monterey.
"The next day, in the afternoon, the party set out on their return, and
the two horses rode by Col. Fremont from San Luis Obispo, being a
present to him from Don Jesus, he (Don Jesus) desired to make an
experiment of what one of them could do. They were brothers, one a grass
younger than the other, both of the same color, (cinnamon,) and hence
called _el cañalo_, or _los cañalos_, (the cinnamon or the cinnamons.)
The elder was to be taken for the trial; and the journey commenced upon
him at leaving Monterey, the afternoon well advanced. Thirty miles under
the saddle done that evening, and the party stopped for the night. In
the morning, the elder cañalo was again under the saddle for Col.
Fremont, and for ninety miles he carried him without a change, and
without apparent fatigue. It was still thirty miles to San Luis Obispo,
where the night was to be passed, and Don Jesus insisted that cañalo
could do it, and so said the horse by his looks and action. But Col.
Fremont would not put him to the trial, and, shifting the saddle to the
younger brother, the elder was turned loose to run the remaining thirty
miles without a rider. He did so, immediately taking the lead and
keeping it all the way, and entering San Luis in a sweeping gallop,
nostrils distended, snuffing the air, and neighing with exultation at
his return to his native pastures; his younger brother all the time at
the head of the horses under the saddle, bearing on his bit, and held in
by his rider. The whole eight horses made their one hundred and twenty
miles each that day, (after thirty the evening before,) the elder
cinnamon making ninety of his under the saddle that day, besides thirty
under the saddle the evening before; nor was there the least doubt that
he would have done the whole distance in the same time if he had
continued under the saddle.
"After a hospitable detention of another half a day at San Luis Obispo,
the party set out for Los Angelos, on the same nine horses which they
had rode from that place, and made the ride back in about the same time
they had made it up, namely, at the rate of 125 miles a day.
"On this ride, the grass on the road was the food for the horses. At
Monterey they had barley; but these horses, meaning those _trained and
domesticated_, as the cañalos were, eat almost anything of vegetable
food, or even drink, that their master uses, by whom they are petted and
caressed, and rarely sold. Bread, fruit, sugar, coffee, and even wine,
(like the Persian horses,) they take from the hand of their master, and
obey with like docility his slightest intimation. A tap of the whip on
the saddle, springs them into action; the check of a thread rein (on the
Spanish bit) would stop them: and stopping short at speed they do not
jostle the rider or throw him forward. They leap on anything--man,
beast, or weapon, on which their master directs them. But this
description, so far as conduct and behavior are concerned, of course
only applies to the trained and domesticated horse."