FREMONT'S THIRD EXPEDITION, AND ACQUISITION OF CALIFORNIA.
In the month of May 1845, Mr. Frémont, then a brevet captain of
engineers (appointed a lieutenant-colonel of Rifles before he
returned), set out on his third expedition of geographical and
scientific exploration in the Great West. Hostilities had not
broken out between the United States and Mexico; but Texas had
been incorporated; the preservation of peace was precarious, and
Mr. Frémont was determined, by no act of his, to increase the
difficulties, or to give any just cause of complaint to the Mexican
government. His line of observation would lead him to the Pacific
Ocean, through a Mexican province--through the desert parts first,
and the settled part afterwards of the Alta California. Approaching
the settled parts of the province at the commencement of winter,
he left his equipment of 60 men and 200 horses on the frontier,
and proceeded alone to Monterey, to make known to the governor
the object of his coming, and his desire to pass the winter (for
the refreshment of his men and horses) in the uninhabited parts
of the valley of the San Joaquin. The permission was granted; but
soon revoked, under the pretext that Mr. Frémont had come into
California, not to pursue science, but to excite the American
settlers to revolt against the Mexican government. Upon this pretext
troops were raised, and marched to attack him. Having notice of
their approach, he took a position on the mountain, hoisted the flag
of the United States, and determined, with his sixty brave men,
to defend himself to the last extremity--never surrendering; and
dying, if need be, to the last man. A messenger came into his camp,
bringing a letter from the American consul at Monterey, to apprise
him of his danger: that messenger, returning, reported that 2,000
men could not force the American position: and that information
had its effect upon the Mexican commander. Waiting four days in
his mountain camp, and not being attacked, he quit his position,
descended from the mountain, and set out for Oregon, that he might
give no further pretext for complaint, by remaining in California.
Turning his back on the Mexican possessions, and looking to Oregon
as the field of his future labors, Mr. Frémont determined to explore
a new route to the Wah-lah-math settlements and the tide-water
region of the Columbia, through the wild and elevated region of the
Tla-math lakes. A romantic interest attached to this region from the
grandeur of its features, its lofty mountains, and snow-clad peaks,
and from the formidable character of its warlike inhabitants. In the
first week of May, he was at the north end of the Great Tla-math
lake, and in Oregon--the lake being cut near its south end by the
parallel of 42 degrees north latitude. On the 8th day of that month,
a strange sight presented itself--almost a startling apparition--two
men riding up, and penetrating a region which few ever approached
without paying toll of life or blood. They proved to be two of Mr.
Frémont's old _voyageurs_, and quickly told their story. They were
part of a guard of six men conducting a United States officer,
who was on his trail with despatches from Washington, and whom
they had left two days back, while they came on to give notice of
his approach, and to ask that assistance might be sent him. They
themselves had only escaped the Indians by the swiftness of their
horses. It was a case in which no time was to be lost, or a mistake
made. Mr. Frémont determined to go himself; and taking ten picked
men, four of them Delaware Indians, he took down the western shore
of the lake on the morning of the 9th (the direction the officer
was to come), and made a ride of sixty miles without a halt. But
to meet men, and not to miss them, was the difficult point in this
trackless region. It was not the case of a high road, where all
travellers must meet in passing each other: at intervals there
were places--defiles, or camping grounds--where both parties must
pass; and watching for these, he came to one in the afternoon, and
decided that, if the party was not killed, it must be there that
night. He halted and encamped; and, as the sun was going down, had
the inexpressible satisfaction to see the four men approaching. The
officer proved to be a lieutenant of the United States marines, who
had been despatched from Washington the November previous, to make
his way by Vera Cruz, the City of Mexico, and Mazatlan to Monterey,
in Upper California, deliver despatches to the United States'
consul there; and then find Mr. Frémont, wherever he should be.
His despatches for Mr. Frémont were only a letter of introduction
from the Secretary of State (Mr. Buchanan), and some letters and
slips of newspapers from Senator Benton and his family, and some
verbal communications from the Secretary of State. The verbal
communications were that Mr. Frémont should watch and counteract any
foreign scheme on California, and conciliate the good will of the
inhabitants towards the United States. Upon this intimation of the
government's wishes, Mr. Frémont turned back from Oregon, in the
edge of which he then was, and returned to California. The letter of
introduction was in the common form, that it might tell nothing if
it fell into the hands of foes, and signified nothing of itself; but
it accredited the bearer, and gave the stamp of authority to what he
communicated; and upon this Mr. Frémont acted: for it was not to be
supposed that Lieutenant Gillespie had been sent so far, and through
so many dangers, merely to deliver a common letter of introduction
on the shores of the Tlamath lake.
The events of some days on the shores of this wild lake, sketched
with the brevity which the occasion requires, may give a glimpse of
the hardships and dangers through which Mr. Frémont pursued science,
and encountered and conquered perils and toils. The night he met Mr.
Gillespie presented one of those scenes to which he was so often
exposed, and which nothing but the highest degree of vigilance and
courage could prevent from being fatal. The camping ground was on
the western side of the lake, the horses picketed with long halters
on the shore, to feed on the grass; and the men (fourteen in number)
sleeping by threes at different fires, disposed in a square; for
danger required them so to sleep as to be ready for an attack; and,
though in the month of May, the elevation of the place, and the
proximity of snow-clad mountains, made the night intensely cold.
His feelings joyfully excited by hearing from home (the first word
of intelligence he had received since leaving the U. S. a year
before), Mr. Frémont sat up by a large fire, reading his letters
and papers, and watching himself over the safety of the camp,
while the men slept. Towards midnight, he heard a movement among
the horses, indicative of alarm and danger. Horses, and especially
mules, become sensitive to danger under long travelling and camping
in the wilderness, and manifest their alarm at the approach of any
thing strange. Taking a six-barrelled pistol in his hand, first
making sure of their ready fire, and, without waking the camp, he
went down among the disturbed animals. The moon shone brightly:
he could see well, but could discover nothing. Encouraged by his
presence, the horses became quiet--poor dumb creatures that could
see the danger, but not tell what they had seen; and he returned to
the camp, supposing it was only some beast of the forest--a bear or
wolf--prowling for food, that had disturbed them. He returned to
the camp fire. Lieutenant Gillespie woke up, and talked with him
awhile, and then lay down again. Finally nature had her course with
Mr. Frémont himself. Excited spirits gave way to exhausted strength.
The day's ride, and the night's excitement demanded the reparation
of repose. He lay down to sleep, and without waking up a man to
watch--relying on the loneliness of the place, and the long ride of
the day, as a security against the proximity of danger. It was the
second time in his twenty thousand miles of wilderness explorations
that his camp had slept without a guard: the first was in his second
expedition, and on an island in the Great Salt Lake, and when the
surrounding water of the lake itself constituted a guard. The whole
camp was then asleep. A cry from Carson roused it. In his sleep he
heard a groan: it was the groan of a man receiving the tomahawk in
his brains. All sprung to their feet. The savages were in the camp:
the hatchet and the winged arrow were at work. Basil Lajeunesse,
a brave and faithful young Frenchman, the follower of Frémont in
all his expeditions, was dead: an Iowa was dead: a brave Delaware
Indian, one of those who had accompanied Frémont from Missouri, was
dying: it was his groan that awoke Carson. Another of the Delawares
was a target for arrows, from which no rifle could save him--only
avenge him. The savages had waited till the moon was in the trees,
casting long shadows over the sleeping camp: then approaching from
the dark side, with their objects between themselves and the fading
light, they used only the hatchet and the formidable bow, whose
arrow went to its mark without a flash or a sound to show whence
it came. All advantages were on the side of the savages: but the
camp was saved! the wounded protected from massacre, and the dead
from mutilation. The men, springing to their feet, with their arms
in their hands, fought with skill and courage. In the morning,
Lieutenant Gillespie recognized, in the person of one of the slain
assailants, the Tlamath chief who the morning before had given him
a salmon, in token of friendship, and who had followed him all day
to kill and rob his party at night--a design in which he would
certainly have been successful had it not been for the promptitude
and precision of Mr. Frémont's movement. Mr. Frémont himself would
have been killed, when he went to the horses, had it not been that
the savages counted upon the destruction of the whole camp, and
feared to alarm it by killing one, before the general massacre.
It was on the 9th of May--a day immortalized by American arms at
Resaca de la Palma--that this fierce and bloody work was done in the
far distant region of the Tlamath lakes.
The morning of the 10th of May was one of gloom in the camp. The
evening sun of the 9th had set upon it full of life and joy at a
happy meeting: the same sun rose upon it the next morning, stained
with blood, ghastly with the dead and wounded, and imposing mournful
duties on the survivors. The wounded were to be carried--the dead
to be buried; and so buried as to be hid and secured from discovery
and violation. They were carried ten miles, and every precaution
taken to secure the remains from the wolf and the savage: for men,
in these remote and solitary dangers, become brothers, and defend
each other living and dead. The return route lay along the shore
of the lake, and during the day the distant canoes of the savages
could be seen upon it, evidently watching the progress of the party,
and meditating a night attack upon it. All precautions, at the
night encampment, were taken for security--horses and men enclosed
in a breastwork of great trees, cut down for the purpose, and half
the men constantly on the watch. At leaving in the morning, an
ambuscade was planted--and two of the Tlamaths were killed by the
men in ambush--a successful return of their own mode of warfare. At
night the main camp, at the north end of the lake, was reached. It
was strongly intrenched, and could not be attacked; but the whole
neighborhood was infested, and scouts and patrols were necessary to
protect every movement. In one of these excursions the Californian
horse, so noted for spirit and docility, showed what he would do
at the bid of his master. Carson's rifle had missed fire, at ten
feet distance. The Tlamath long bow, arrow on the string, was
bending to the pull. All the rifles in the party could not have
saved him. A horse and his rider did it. Mr. Frémont touched his
horse; he sprang upon the savage! and the hatchet of a Delaware
completed the deliverance of Carson. It was a noble horse, an iron
gray, with a most formidable name--el Toro del Sacramento: and
which vindicated his title to the name in all the trials of travel,
courage, and performance to which he was subjected. It was in the
midst of such dangers as these, that science was pursued by Mr.
Frémont; that the telescope was carried to read the heavens; the
barometer to measure the elevations of the earth; the thermometer
to gauge the temperature of the air; the pencil to sketch the
grandeur of mountains, and to paint the beauty of flowers; the pen
to write down whatever was new, or strange, or useful in the works
of nature. It was in the midst of such dangers, and such occupations
as these, and in the wildest regions of the Farthest West, that Mr.
Frémont was pursuing science and shunning war, when the arrival
of Lieutenant Gillespie, and his communications from Washington,
suddenly changed all his plans, turned him back from Oregon, and
opened a new and splendid field of operations in California itself.
He arrived in the valley of the Sacramento in the month of May,
1846, and found the country alarmingly, and critically situated.
Three great operations, fatal to American interests, were then going
on, and without remedy, if not arrested at once. These were: 1. The
massacre of the Americans, and the destruction of their settlements,
in the valley of the Sacramento. 2. The subjection of California to
British protection. 3. The transfer of the public domain to British
subjects. And all this with a view to anticipate the events of a
Mexican war, and to shelter California from the arms of the United
States.
The American settlers sent a deputation to the camp of Mr. Frémont,
in the valley of the Sacramento, laid all these dangers before him,
and implored him to place himself at their head and save them
from destruction. General Castro was then in march upon them: the
Indians were incited to attack their families, and burn their wheat
fields, and were only waiting for the dry season to apply the torch.
Juntas were in session to transfer the country to Great Britain:
the public domain was passing away in large grants to British
subjects: a British fleet was expected on the coast: the British
vice consul, Forbes, and the emissary priest, Macnamara, ruling
and conducting every thing: and all their plans so far advanced
as to render the least delay fatal. It was then the beginning of
June. War had broken out between the United States and Mexico,
but that was unknown in California. Mr. Frémont had left the two
countries at peace when he set out upon his expedition, and was
determined to do nothing to disturb their relations: he had even
left California to avoid giving offence; and to return and take up
arms in so short a time was apparently to discredit his own previous
conduct as well as to implicate his government. He felt all the
responsibilities of his position; but the actual approach of Castro,
and the immediate danger of the settlers, left him no alternative.
He determined to put himself at the head of the people, and to save
the country. To repulse Castro was not sufficient: to overturn the
Mexican government in California, and to establish Californian
Independence, was the bold resolve, and the only measure adequate to
the emergency. That resolve was taken, and executed with a celerity
that gave it a romantic success. The American settlers rushed to
his camp--brought their arms, horses and ammunition--were formed
into a battalion; and obeyed with zeal and alacrity the orders they
received. In thirty days all the northern part of California was
freed from Mexican authority--Independence proclaimed--the flag
of Independence raised--Castro flying to the south--the American
settlers saved from destruction; and the British party in California
counteracted and broken up in all their schemes.
This movement for Independence was the salvation of California, and
snatched it out of the hands of the British at the moment they were
ready to clutch it. For two hundred years--from the time of the
navigator Drake, who almost claimed it as a discovery, and placed
the English name of New Albion upon it--the eye of England has
been upon California; and the magnificent bay of San Francisco,
the great seaport of the North Pacific Ocean, has been surveyed as
her own. The approaching war between Mexico and the United States
was the crisis in which she expected to realize the long-deferred
wish for its acquisition; and carefully she took her measures
accordingly. She sent two squadrons to the Pacific as soon as Texas
was incorporated--well seeing the actual war which was to grow
out of that event--a small one into the mouth of the Columbia,
an imposing one to Mazatlan, on the Mexican coast, to watch the
United States squadron there, and to anticipate its movements upon
California. Commodore Sloat commanding the squadron at Mazatlan,
saw that he was watched, and pursued, by Admiral Seymour, who
lay alongside of him, and he determined to deceive him. He stood
out to sea, and was followed by the British Admiral. During the
day he bore west, across the ocean, as if going to the Sandwich
Islands: Admiral Seymour followed. In the night the American
commodore tacked, and ran up the coast towards California: the
British admiral, not seeing the tack, continued on his course, and
went entirely to the Sandwich Islands before he was undeceived.
Commodore Sloat arrived before Monterey on the second of July,
entering the port amicably, and offering to salute the town, which
the authorities declined on the pretext that they had no powder
to return it--in reality because they momentarily expected the
British fleet. Commodore Sloat remained five days before the town,
and until he heard of Frémont's operations: then believing that
Frémont had orders from his government to take California, he having
none himself, he determined to act himself. He received the news
of Frémont's successes on the 6th day of July: on the 7th he took
the town of Monterey, and sent a despatch to Frémont. This latter
came to him in all speed, at the head of his mounted force. Going
immediately on board the commodore's vessel, an explanation took
place. The commodore learnt with astonishment that Frémont had no
orders from his government to commence hostilities--that he had
acted entirely on his own responsibility. This left the commodore
without authority for having taken Monterey; for still at this time,
the commencement of the war with Mexico was unknown. Uneasiness came
upon the commodore. He remembered the fate of Captain Jones in
making the mistake of seizing the town once before in time of peace.
He resolved to return to the United States, which he did--turning
over the command of the squadron to Commodore Stockton, who had
arrived on the 15th. The next day (16th) Admiral Seymour arrived;
his flagship the Collingwood, of 80 guns, and his squadron the
largest British fleet ever seen in the Pacific. To his astonishment
he beheld the American flag flying over Monterey, the American
squadron in its harbor, and Frémont's mounted riflemen encamped
over the town. His mission was at an end. The prize had escaped
him. He attempted nothing further, and Frémont and Stockton rapidly
pressed the conquest of California to its conclusion. The subsequent
military events can be traced by any history: they were the natural
sequence of the great measure conceived and executed by Frémont
before any squadron had arrived upon the coast, before he knew of
any war with Mexico, and without any authority from his government,
except the equivocal and enigmatical visit of Mr. Gillespie. Before
the junction of Mr. Frémont with Commodore Sloat and Stockton, his
operations had been carried on under the flag of Independence--the
Bear Flag, as it was called--the device of the bear being adopted
on account of the courageous qualities of that animal (the white
bear), which never gives the road to men,--which attacks any
number,--and fights to the last with increasing ferocity, with
amazing strength of muscle, and with an incredible tenacity of the
vital principle--never more formidable and dangerous than when
mortally wounded. The Independents took the device of this bear for
their flag, and established the independence of California under it:
and in joining the United States forces, hauled down this flag, and
hoisted the flag of the United States. And the fate of California
would have been the same whether the United States squadrons had
arrived, or not; and whether the Mexican war had happened, or
not. California was in a revolutionary state, already divided
from Mexico politically as it had always been geographically. The
last governor-general from Mexico, Don Michel Toreno, had been
resisted--fought--captured--and shipped back to Mexico, with his
300 cut-throat soldiers. An insurgent government was in operation,
determined to be free of Mexico, sensible of inability to stand
alone, and looking, part to the United States, part to Great
Britain, for the support which they needed. All the American
settlers were for the United States protection, and joined Frémont.
The leading Californians were also joining him. His conciliatory
course drew them rapidly to him. The Picos, who were the leading
men of the revolt (Don Pico, Don Andres, and Don Jesus), became his
friends. California, become independent of Mexico by the revolt of
the Picos, and independent of them by the revolt of the American
settlers, had its destiny to fulfil--which was, to be handed over
to the United States. So that its incorporation with the American
Republic was equally sure in any, and every event.