MEXICO. 



ihe foreign mercenaries in the Imperial service 

 numbered about 20,000, and the native troops 

 as many more. Hence it was suspected that 

 the reports of large reiinforcemcnts, sent by* 

 Marshal Bazaine to Queretaro and San Luis 

 Potosi in January and February, had reference, 

 not to a new movement of the Imperialists into 

 Northern Mexico, but to a concentration of 

 forces for the purpose of covering a general re- 

 treat from that part of the country. 



Military operations in the early part of the 

 year in Chihuahua and Coahuila were of too 

 desultory a character to be worth the descrip- 

 tion ; but in Sonora and Sinaloa something 

 more resembling a systematic plan of campaign 

 seems to have been attempted. On the 7th of 

 January the Republicans captured Alamos, de- 

 scribed as the key of Sonora, committing, it is 

 said, great excesses ; and so active were the 

 movements of Pesquiera and his colleagues that 

 in May the Imperialists held within this State 

 only the seaport Guaymas, and Hermosillo and 

 Ures, the principal positions in the valley of the 

 San Pedro. "We may look where we will," 

 said the Imperial commander at Ures, in a 

 proclamation dated March 26th, *' we. can see 

 nothing but acts of vandalism, violence, death, 

 and blood. The dissidents seem to desire the 

 wreck of the whole country, and, aided by the 

 desperadoes of the bordering States and Terri- 

 tories of the United States, they are sweeping 

 the country as with a brand of blood. "We have 

 been left a mere handful of men to cope with 

 the myrmidons of Juarez. All that there now 

 remains must either become sacrifices to this 

 tornado of blood or seek safety in flight." On 

 the 4th of May Pesquiera captured Hermosillo 

 by assault, and for hours the town was given up 

 to plunder and excesses of all kinds ; but two 

 days later he was driven out by Tanori, an Im- 

 perialist leader. The loss of property from the 

 operations of war in Alamos and Hermosillo 

 alone was estimated at $2,500,000. While the 

 Imperialists were thus hard pressed in Sonora, 

 in Sinaloa they fared no better, and the sea- 

 port, Mazatlan, where alone they maintained 

 'a considerable force, was, like Guaymas, so 

 closely beset by guerillas, as t be practically 

 in a state of siege. In March they were de- 

 feated near this place by Corona, and in the 

 succeeding month a considerable force of Im- 

 perialists, which, under the command of Losada, 

 had marched to their succor from the State of 

 Jalisco, was so roughly handled by the same 

 leader, that it was compelled to retreat to 

 Tepic. Thither it was followed by Corona, who 

 first left a force sufficiently large to invest Maz- 

 atlan on the land side. 



"While matters were proceeding thus favorably 

 tor the Republican cause in the north the for- 

 tunes of war were more varied in the south. 

 In Oajaca the Republicans experienced repeated 

 defeats, and their small and scattered forces 

 could do little more than perform guerilla ser- 

 vice. In Michoacan, however, they were more 

 fortunate, and in a severe engagement near 



Morelia in February, between Regules on the 

 one side, and the Imperialist Mendez on the 

 other, the latter was so nruch crippled as to 

 be compelled to go in person to Mexico and ask 

 for reinforcements. With a vitality surprising 

 in a people who for three years had encoun- 

 tered almost constant defeat, partisan bands 

 continued to make their appearance in all parts 

 of Michoacan and Oajaca, and even threatened 

 the important towns of Puebla and Orizaba, 

 causing considerable alarm in the capital. 



Turning again to the north we find Escobodo 

 recuperated from the disastrous campaign of 

 the previous year against Mejia in Matamoras, 

 gathering his forces for another attack upon that 

 place, and sending partisan bands of foragers 

 far down into Zacatecas and San Luis Potosi. 

 Such was the enterprise displayed by the Re- 

 publicans, coupled with the difficulty expe- 

 rienced by the Imperialists in holding the vast 

 territorial area which they claimed to have con- 

 quered in the north, that by the 1st of May the 

 latter probably controlled less territory than 

 in any month during the two previous years. 

 In April Escobedo, joining his own command 

 to several smaller bodies of partisan troops, cap- 

 tured Catorce, in the State of San Luis Potosi, 

 next to Guanajuato, the seat of the largest mint 

 in Mexico, where he seized a large sum in newly- 

 coined silver. Continuing to gain strength 

 while the Imperialists exhibited a weakness 

 which was significant of coming disaster, he 

 soon afterward again laid siege to Matamoras, 

 or rather remained in the neighborhood of the 

 city, in the hope that an opportunity would oc- 

 cur to seize the prize so long coveted by the 

 Republicans. Such a one was afforded in the 

 latter part of June, when, in consequence of the 

 weakening of the Imperial garrison by the de- 

 parture of a force to protect the transit of mer- 

 chandise to Monterey, Mejia found himself com- 

 pelled to surrender. The terms, however, were 

 reported to be very favorable, the troops in 

 Matamoras and those detached to Monterey, 

 which had also been captured, having been soon 

 after liberated, and security promised to private 

 persons and property. This, the first signal suc- 

 cess gained by the Republicans in two years, 

 may be considered the turning point in the 

 struggle between them and the imperialists for 

 the possession of Mexico. Thenceforth it will 

 remain for us to chronicle a series of almost 

 uniform successes for the Republicans, induced 

 in no small degree by other circumstances than 

 strategic skill or superior resources, which, at 

 the close of 1866, left the empire of Maximilian 

 apparently tottering to its fall. 



While matters thus looked more hopeful for 

 the Republican cause in the northeast, no ma- 

 terial change was perceptible along the Pacific 

 coast or in the south. In the former quarter 

 the Imperialists still clung to the seaports, 

 which, with the aid of French war vessels, 

 they seemed abundantly able to hold, although 

 estopped from any attempt to penetrate again 

 into the interior. Acapulco, in Guerrero, ^rav 



