Fremont's character — services — trial. 349 



Navy Departments, and were calculated, as distinguished officers 

 afterwards declared officially, to " embarrass the mind, and to excite 

 the doubts of officers of greater experience" than the Colonel. 



Although Fremont's services were lost for a while on the shores 

 of the Pacific, he was not forgotten either there, or at home. What 

 he had done for his country in that remote region by exploring its 

 solitudes with his hardy band ; what he added to geographical and 

 general science; what regions he almost revealed to American 

 pioneers; what services he rendered in securing a happy issue to 

 the war in California — have all been recollected with gratitude and 

 rewarded with the virgin honors of the newborn State. But, at 

 that time, this brilliant officer who combined the science of Hum- 

 boldt with the energy and more than the generosity of Cortez, w T as 

 doomed to suffer more than the temporary deprivation of power. 

 After the war was in reality over, after Commodore Stockton had 

 departed and General Kearney had assumed the governorship which 

 was subsequently given to Colonel Mason — Fremont was refused 

 permission to continue his scientific pursuits in California or to join 

 his regiment on the active fields of Mexico. When General Kear- 

 ney turned his face homewards, towards the close of the spring of 

 1847, Fremont was ordered to follow in his train across the moun- 

 tains, and was finally arrested at Fort Leavenworth, on the borders 

 of civilization. During the next winter he was tried by a Court 

 Martial on charges of mutiny, disobedience, and conduct to the 

 prejudice of good order and military discipline, and being found 

 guilty was sentenced to be dismissed the service. A majority of 

 the court, however, considering all the circumstances of the case, 

 recommended him to the lenient judgment of the President, who not 

 being satisfied that the facts proved the military crime of mutiny — 

 though he sustained the court's opinion otherwise — and recognizing 

 Fremont's previous meritorious and valuable services, released him 

 from arrest, restored his sword and ordered him to report for duty. 

 But Fremont, feeling unconscious, as he declared, of having done 

 any thing to merit the finding of the court, declined the offered 

 restoration to the service, as he could not, " by accepting the 

 clemency of the President, admit the justice of the decision against 

 him." 



45 



