The state supplied one of ten regiments for the regular army and a mounted company for the Third United States Dragoons. Although this company was organized in Detroit, it was composed of picked men from both Michigan and Wisconsin, none under six feet in height being accepted. Notwithstanding this restriction, the company was quickly formed and was mustered into the United States service with Andrew T. McReynolds as captain; John Brown, first lieutenant; J. C. Devereau Williams, second lieutenant. This was the only mounted company to be raised in Michigan and Wisconsin. It left Detroit by way of the lakes on April 24, 1847, and arrived at Vera Cruz, Mexico, on the 20th of May. The appearance and discipline of the stalwart men made such an impression on Gen. Winfield Scott that he declared the company to be the finest body of soldiers he had ever seen and attached it to his personal escort. The company served under General Scott until the close of the war. About the time the dragoons left for the front an infantry company numbering 118 men was raised in Southeastern Michigan, about three-fourths of the members coming from Detroit. Of this company, known as Company G, Fifteenth United States Infantry, F. D. Winans was captain; William D. Wilkins, first lieutenant; M. P. Doyle, second lieutenant. Almost as soon as the organization of the company was completed it was ordered to Mackinaw to relieve some regular troops at that place, and in June following it was ordered to the front. On the way to Mexico, the company arrived at Detroit on June 26, 1847, and was there given an ovation. It left by boat the same evening.

Company G, Fifteenth United States Infantry, was relieved at Mackinaw by a company of infantry organized at Detroit. It was mustered in on June 18, 1847, with M. L. Gage as captain; A. K. Howard, first lieutenant; W. F. Chittenden and C. F. Davis, second lieutenants. This company garrisoned the posts at Mackinaw and Sault Ste. Marie until mustered out in the spring of 1848. It was called the "Brady Guards," though it was in no way connected with the old militia company of that name.

Under a second call for volunteers in 1847, Michigan was asked to furnish a full regiment of infantry. The state promptly answered the call and the First Volunteer Regiment was organized with T. B. W. Stockton as colonel; Alpheus S. Williams, lieutenant-colonel; John V. Ruehle, major, and James E. Pittman, adjutant. The captains of the several companies composing the regiment were: F. W. Curtenius, Company A; Grove A. Buel, Company B; A. H. Hanscom, Company C; Nicholas Gruesel, Jr., Company D; Isaac S. Rowland, Company E; John Wittenmeyer, Company F; Daniel Hicks, Company G; Walter W. Dean, Company H; John Van Arman, Company I; James M. Williams, Company K.

Companies B, C and D left Detroit on December 24, 1847, and were followed the next day by Companies A, E and F. These six companies were commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Williams. The remainder of the regiment, under command of Col. John Stockton, left Detroit on the steamer "Albany" on February 9, 1848. This was just a week after the conclusion of the treaty ending the war, but news of that event had not yet been received in Michigan.

TREATY OF GUADALUPE HIDALGO

When James K. Polk was inaugurated on March 4, 1845, it was his ambition to acquire California, though the means by which his dream was to be realized were uncertain. The territory might be acquired by conquest; it might be secured by filling it with emigrants from the United States, who would ultimately

bring it into the Union as Texas had been annexed; or it might be possible to win the good will of the citizens, who were already chafing under Mexican rule. Early in 1846 Lieut. John C. Fremont's expedition entered the Sacramento Valley and introduced a fourth plan for the acquisition of the territory. Fremont established an independent government, known as the "Bear Flag Republic," under the control of the American settlers in the valley. When war was declared on May 13, 1846, the Bear Flag was replaced by the Stars and Stripes.

Col. Stephen W. Kearney captured the Town of Santa Fe and New Mexico was acquired almost without loss of life. By the close of the year 1846 practically all the territory desired by the administration was held by the United States military forces, though Mexico still remained unconquered.

In the spring of 1847 President Polk sent Nicholas P. Trist, a Virginian and chief clerk in the department of state, to Gen. Winfield Scott's headquarters for the purpose of entering into negotiations with the Mexican Government for the restoration of peace. Trist was instructed, among other things, to demand the cession of California and New Mexico and the recognition of the Rio Grande as the international boundary. On February 2, 1848, Trist succeeded in negotiating the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (a small place on the outskirts of the City of Mexico), which embodied these features. By this treaty Mexico ceded to the United States all her territory north of the Rio Grande, comprising the present states of Arizona, California, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah, the western part of Colorado and the southwest corner of Wyoming. For this vast expanse of country Mexico received the sum of $15,000,000 and the United States further agreed to assume the payment of claims held by citizens of this country against the Mexican Government, provided the total amount of such claims did not exceed $3,250,000.

THE HOME COMING

For some time after the conclusion of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, United States troops remained in Mexico to preserve order. On July 8, 1848, a part of Colonel Stockton's regiment arrived on the steamer "John Owen." The second detachment arrived on the 10th and the remainder on Sunday, July 16th. This last detachment was accompanied by Captain Winans' company and came from Chicago by way of the lakes. Their boat was met on Lake St. Clair by the ferry steamer "Alliance" bearing the Scott Guards, a number of citizens and a band, and the returning victors were escorted in triumph to the city to the strains of martial music.

The cost to the state of raising the First Regiment was $10,165.85. On January 15, 1848, the Legislature appropriated $5,000 for the purpose of raising the Second Regiment, which was organized and mustered into the United States service, but the war ended before it was ordered to Mexico. The total cost to the state in raising, equipping and subsisting troops was $17,193.70.

At the breaking out of the war Detroit was without telegraph service, there were no fast mail trains, and news from the seat of war, always anxiously awaited, came by boat. Capt. Joseph Taylor, an officer in the regular army and a brother of Gen. Zachary Taylor, was then stationed in Detroit. Naturally he was interested in the movements of his brother and whenever the arrival of a vessel was expected he spent much of his time on the wharf, in order to be among the first to hear the news. On one of these occasions he was accom

panied by Judge Ross Wilkins, but the boat was delayed, the judge grew tired of waiting and went home. Not so with Captain Taylor, who remained on watch until the arrival of the vessel. He was rewarded for his patience, for the boat brought the news of General Taylor's victory at Palo Alto. Notwithstanding the lateness of the hour, he hurried to Judge Wilkins' house, rang the door-bell, and not meeting with a ready response, began pounding upon the door. When the judge opened the door the excited captain began shouting at the top of his voice: "Hurrah! my brother has licked the Mexicans at Palo Alto! Hurrah! Hurrah!"

That Detroit was "not too conservative" on the subject of the war may be seen in the fact that places of business were named after battles in which the United States arms were victorious. Col. Nathaniel Prouty, who kept a hotel on Sixth Street, between Walnut Street and Grand River Avenue, changed the name of his hostelry to the "Buena Vista House," by which it was known for many years. On Monroe Avenue was a popular bowling alley, which took the name of the "Palo Alto or 8th of May Saloon."

CHAPTER XLIII

WAR OF THE REBELLION

THE SLAVERY QUESTION-POLITICAL CAMPAIGN OF 1860-SECESSION-STAR OF THE WEST INCIDENT-FALL OF FORT SUMTER-LINCOLN'S PROCLAMATION CALLING FOR TROOPS HOW MICHIGAN ANSWERED THE CALL-HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF THE MILITARY ORGANIZATIONS IN WHICH DETROIT AND WAYNE COUNTY WERE REPRESENTED- CAPTURE OF LAKE STEAMERS THE WORK AT HOME- SOLDIERS' AND SAILORS' MONUMENT-GENERAL GRANT A RESI—

DENT OF DETROIT.

It has been said that "War awakens in the people a patriotic sentiment that cannot be aroused by any other means." However that may be, much of the history of human progress centers about the deeds of great military commanders and their armies. Aggressive wars have been waged by strong nations for the conquest of weaker ones, or to uphold the regal power and "divine right" of kings; and defensive wars have been fought to advance. the rights and liberties of the people, or to maintain established governments. Of all the great nations of the civilized world, the United States is the only one which has never declared war except to defend her institutions, or to secure greater liberties for downtrodden humanity.

THE SLAVERY QUESTION

One of the great wars of history was the Civil war of 1861-65, between the Northern and Southern States, commonly known as the War of the Rebellion. In this great conflict the South fought to dissolve and the North to preserve the Union of States. Almost from the very beginning of the American Republic, the slavery question became a "bone of contention" between the free states on one side and the slave states on the other. Slavery was introduced into America in 1619, when a Dutch trader sold a few negroes to the planters of the Jamestown colony in Virginia. The planters found slave labor profitable and the custom of owning negro slaves gradually spread to the other colonies. But by 1819 seven of the original thirteen states had made provisions for the emancipation of the slaves within their borders.

The first clause of Section 9, Article I, of the Federal constitution provides that "The migration or importation of such persons as any of the states now existing shall think proper to admit shall not be prohibited by Congress prior to the year 1808, but a tax or duty may be imposed on such importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each person."

The adoption of this clause was regarded as a victory for the slaveholding element, as under it Congress had no power to interfere with the foreign slave trade until 1808. But in that year an act was passed prohibiting further traffic in or importation of negro slaves. In 1819 slavery existed in only six of the original thirteen states, the other seven having abolished it as already stated. In the meantime Kentucky, Tennessee, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama had been admitted with constitutions permitting slavery, and Vermont, Ohio,

Indiana and Illinois as free states, so that the Union was evenly divided into eleven free and eleven slave states.

Maine was admitted as a free state in 1820 and the advocates of slavery sought to have Missouri admitted as a slave state, in order to maintain the equilibrium in the United States Senate. After a long and somewhat acrimonious debate, the state was admitted under the act known as the "Missouri Compromise," which provided for the admission of Missouri without any restrictions as to slavery, but expressly stipulated that in all the remaining portion of the Louisiana Purchase north of the line of 36° 30′ slavery should be forever prohibited. During the next twenty-five years the slavery question remained comparatively quiet, owing to the admission of free and slave states in equal number. Arkansas came into the Union as a slave state in 1836 and Michigan as a free state in 1837. The admission of Florida as a slave state in 1845 was offset by the admission of Iowa as a free state in 1846.

At the conclusion of the Mexican war in 1847, the United states came into possession of a large expanse of territory in the Southwest, to which the advocates of slavery laid claim, and again the question came up as a subject for legislation. The result was the enactment of the compromise of 1850, commonly called the "Omnibus Bill." The opponents of slavery took the view that the act was a violation of the provisions of the Missouri Compromise, because it sought to carry slavery north of the designated line of 36° 30'. Four years later Congress passed the "Kansas-Nebraska Bill," which added fresh fuel to the already raging flames. The passage of this measure was one of the causes that led to the organization of the republican party, which opposed the extension of slavery to any new territory of the United States whatever.

POLITICAL CAMPAIGN OF 1860

In the political campaign of 1860 the issues were clearly defined and some of the slave states declared their intention to withdraw from the Union in the event of Abraham Lincoln's election to the Presidency. The people of the North regarded these declarations as so many idle threats, made merely for political effect. Through a division in the democratic party, Mr. Lincoln was elected and on December 20, 1860, South Carolina carried her threat into effect, when a state convention passed an ordinance of secession, declaring the state's connection with the Union severed and that "all allegiance to the Government of the United States is at an end."

Mississippi followed with a similar ordinance on January 9, 1861; Florida seceded on January 10th; Alabama, January 11th; Georgia, January 19th; Louisiana, January 26th; Texas, February 1st. All these states except Texas sent delegates to a convention at Montgomery, Alabama, February 4, 1861, when a tentative constitution was adopted for the "Confederate States of America;" Jefferson Davis, of Mississippi, was elected provisional president and Alexander H. Stephens, of Georgia, provisional vice president. They were inaugurated on February 22, 1861, the anniversary of the birth of George Washington. Consequently, when Mr. Lincoln came into office on March 4, 1861, he found seven states in open rebellion and with an organized government in opposition to his administration. Yet, in the face of all this, the President, his advisers and the people of the North generally, clung to the hope that a reconciliation could be effected and that the citizens of the seceded states could be induced to return to their allegiance. Vain hope!